Many shoppers assume that what they buy at the store is ready to eat as soon as they open the package.

One older customer soon learned that the shrimp she purchased still needed a little more work in the kitchen.

But she didn’t find out until it was far too late.

You’ll want to read on for this one.

Frozen Does Not Mean Ready-To-Eat

Over a decade ago, I used to work for a mom-and-pop seafood store (think butcher shop, only with seafood instead).

We sold a wide variety of shrimp, including cooked cocktail shrimp, frozen peeled and deveined, frozen in-shell, thawed/fresh in-shell, etc.

But not all customers knew how to prepare this food properly.

One older lady decided to buy frozen peeled and deveined shrimp.

Since it was from the freezer, she could just grab it and check out, so there was no conversation with her about how she planned to use it.

Fun fact: peeled and deveined does not mean cooked.

So of course, she came back upset.

The lady came back the next day with the now-thawed bag of shrimp, very upset and complaining that the color was grey instead of pink, and the texture and taste were quite awful.

I overheard this conversation, as well as the manager’s response: “You ate this shrimp without cooking it?”

Luckily, the customer was open to the feedback and was able to procure more shrimp.

Luckily, the older lady—while embarrassed—could admit she made a mistake.

Because she was so nice, the manager gave her a discount on some cooked cocktail shrimp that was edible as-is.

A happy ending, but also a good reminder to check if the food you buy needs to be cooked or not first!

Her pride may have been a little bruised, but at least she got what she wanted by the end of it.

What did Reddit think?

It never hurts to check the preparation instructions.

This commenter is having some important realizations.

It’s tough to watch customers make such big mistakes with preparing their food.

This commenter thinks the customer simply should have known better.

It wasn’t the dinner she originally planned, but it was a lesson she wouldn’t forget.

Next time, she’d double-check the label before digging in.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check this one out about a man who created a points system for his inheritance, and a family friend ends up getting almost all of it.