This year's "early" Hungarian Christmas isn't just a dangerous time for the country's pigs. Over the past few days, there have been two separate stories involving food unfit for human consumption nevertheless being sold to humans in Hungary. On Tuesday, it was revealed that police had discovered ten tons of past-date-of-sale food in a cellar in Budapest's District VII, along with the tools to re-label it as fresh. Meanwhile, this morning, we hear that 13 tons of Italian pears sprayed with a twice the legal limit of fungicide cannot be accounted for after being sold in Hungarian stores.

The concentration of fungicide is said to be only dangerous if eaten in large quantities, so no reason to panic. But it's a good reminder to always wash off fresh fruit and vegetables before you eat them, and to take a closer look at the "last-date-of-sale" stickers on any French hens or turtle doves you buy in Hungary.