‘This person has obviously never cleaned an animal’: TikToker claims Costco chicken has parasites in it, gets roasted

A TikToker has attracted criticism after posting a video that she claims shows a Costco rotisserie chicken infested with parasites. The only problem? The video shows a completely normal rotisserie chicken.

In the video, which has more than 89,000 views, Adii Chavez (user @nakedbeauty) claims that a hole through the chicken and several small dark spots are evidence that something is amiss with her Costco meal.

“This was in the center of one of the breasts. There’s a hole right there,” she says in the video. “Also have been finding a bunch of parasites in this chicken.”

Users were quick to point out that what Adii actually found was, in fact, a chicken.

“lol that’s not a parasite it’s a vein,” wrote one user.

Others concurred. “​​Ma’am, that’s a vein,” another TikToker chimed in, with a further questioning: “Where is the so called parasite?”

“Y’all ever heard of connective tissue, veins and tendons?” asked another. “This person has obviously never cleaned an animal before.”

With regards to the hole in the meat, commenters claim there’s a perfectly innocent explanation.

“The hole is because they need to take the temp every so many hours,” claimed one user. “They poke through the vents of the chicken lids.”

While some users mocked Adii, this confusion is apparently common. Numerous posters on Reddit, such as users PreGhostHuman and 2toness, have made posts questioning whether they’ve found a worm or parasite in their chicken meat. Comments under these posts again assert they’ve most likely just found a vein or a connective tissue.

As far as the other parts of the meat are concerned, the USDA has a page detailing why chicken may occasionally appear discolored, even when cooked perfectly.

“Since [the chicken’s] bones have not calcified completely, pigment from the bone marrow can seep through the porous bones. When the chicken is cooked, the pigment turns dark,” they write. Later, they note: “It’s perfectly safe to eat chicken meat that turns dark near the bone during cooking.”

However, even if there was a parasite in Adii’s chicken (though, to be clear, it appears there wasn’t), the cooking process would have killed it. A 2019 paper determined that, to inactivate most parasites, meat must only be cooked at “60–75 °C for 15–30 min” (~140–167 °F). Rotisserie ovens cook chicken between 300 and 350 °F, with a four-pound chicken requiring almost two hours of cook time.

But if the chicken did in fact have a parasite, some TikTokers say they wouldn’t have minded.

“For 5 bucks already cooked,” said one user, “Ima eat it with or with out extra protein.”

Adii did not immediately respond to Daily Dot’s request for comment via TikTok comment. Costco did not immediately respond to Daily Dot’s request for comment via media request form. 

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