This image photo shows a signboard of an Uotami pub. (Mainichi/Kenji Yoneda)

       TOKYO -- A major izakaya Japanese pub chain apologized on Nov. 17, after a customer's tweet showing insects in their food went viral in the early hours of Nov. 16 and incited a flood of criticism.

       According to the Twitter posts and other information, the customer is believed to have visited the Akabane Higashiguchi Ekimae branch of the Uotami izakaya pub in Kita Ward, Tokyo, with several other people.

       In addition to the image of dozens of tiny brown insect-like dots floating on a small plate of soup taken from a Motsunabe hot pot dish, the customer also tweeted, "I ordered a Motsunabe hot pot and there were about 1,000 insects in it," "There are insects in other dishes too; it's so disgusting," "I ate half of it," and so on.

       They also posted that they were dissatisfied with the staff's response when they complained to the store about "insect contamination." As of the evening of Nov. 17, the images and tweets are still being spread repeatedly on the internet.

       The store operator, restaurant giant Monteroza Co. based in Musashino, Tokyo, acknowledged the contamination to the Mainichi Shimbun on Nov. 17, saying, "It seems that a large number of aphid-like insects were mixed in due to insufficient washing of Chinese cabbage. This should not have happened and we deeply apologize to our customers."

       According to the general affairs and planning division of Monteroza, an employee of the head office who came to work on the morning of Nov. 16 confirmed an email to the "customer service center" with a similar complaint about the Uotami store. On the same day, the public health center in charge of the store also informed the company that they would conduct an on-site inspection.

       Regarding the results of the inspection, a representative of the division explained to the Mainichi Shimbun, "There were no indications of any problems with hygiene in the kitchen, but there was an opinion that the problem may have been caused by insufficient cleaning that failed to properly remove insects such as aphids that were attached to the Chinese cabbage." The company is still investigating the details.

       It was also found that the complaint from the customer was not reported smoothly from the pub to the head office. The person in charge said, "We believe that our response to the customer when we received the complaint was also inappropriate, and we will work to prevent a recurrence by thoroughly implementing hygiene management and employee training at all of our establishments so that this kind of thing will never happen again."

       Monteroza is one of Japan's major food service companies, operating a number of izakaya pub brands. One of them is Uotami, which has about 500 outlets across the country.

       (Japanese original by Yuka Obuno, Digital News Center)

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