Woman Finds What She Suspects is a Frog in Her Cheesecake Factory Meal

A Florida college student alleged in a viral TikTok that she found something far worse in her Cheesecake Factory to-go order than shrimp tails in her Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

Bethany Goodwin, a sophomore at the University of Florida, was so horrified to discover an unidentified black lump in her mashed potatoes that she pulled out her camera to document the gross finding on Tuesday.

"What the f**k? What is this, is in my potato?" she asked. She began pushing around the object and stabbed it aggressively with her fork several times, calling it "indestructible."

When she decided to get to the bottom of it and rinse the finding in the sink, she wrote, "I deada** think this is a baby frog." The video ends with Goodwin on the verge of tears and gagging.

The video, captioned "There was a FROG in my cheesecake factory order should I sue," has been viewed over 7 million times and liked by nearly 2 million horrified TikTok users.

"Omg the way her plate was completely devoured I'd cry myself to sleep," one wrote. "If this happened to me it would send me over the edge," another said. One person even joked that Goodwin would win if she took legal action: "You just came into a lot of money."

Shortly after finishing her meal, she reached out to research professors with access to the science labs at her college to further investigate and corroborate her frog findings.

"I know this sounds funny but if you can help me dissect this and determine if it's a frog I would appreciate it," she explained. In one professor's response, he noted, "Had to read your message twice to believe what I was reading ... I have eaten frog legs before, but I would not want to eat that."

A follow-up video posted on Wednesday revealed that after taking the sample to the University of Florida lab, it wasn't a small frog in her food, but rather a large piece of "black mold." Later in the evening, she uploaded an additional video in the Cheesecake Factory saga, claiming that since eating her meal the night prior, her throat was red and felt sore.

"So this is super nasty but basically my throat really started hurting after yesterday," Goodwin said. "I think it might be because of mold."

Concerned viewers keeping up with the restaurant drama insisted she go to a doctor or emergency clinic. "Ya bestie [your] tonsils [are] swollen ... looks like a throat infection," one hypothesized. "Go to the doctor and then sue lmao."

In a comment to The Daily Dot, The Cheesecake Factory has "been in touch" with Goodwin and was "very concerned to hear of this incident." "We take food safety and sanitation very seriously and are committed to providing a safe dining experience to all of our guests whether they dine-in or order take-out and delivery," the official statement read.

The Cheesecake Factory has also been in the news recently as their job application process was scrutinized in a separate TikTok video. The hiring questionnaire allegedly included an oddly existential question about the state of humanity that the company defended as a method to "gauge positivity" in prospective employees.

Newsweek reached out to Goodwin, but she did not immediately respond to the request for comment.