Flies are coming off my broccoli

[Interestingnamesuggestion]

I took the plastic wrap off a head of broccoli this evening and as I started to cut it up, I noticed a white fly in front of my face. I saw another one and I put the broccoli under the kitchen tap to rinse it off. Suddenly more and more tiny white flies started coming out! I couldn't see any on the broccoli but they just kept appearing!

The broccoli is outside now in a tin but I'm still thinking about it. I'm not usually a wimp about food and I've picked out a boiled slug before, discreetly hid it and carried on eating. But this is making me uncomfortable for some reason. There were so many and they just kept coming out.

So what should I do? Can I still cook and eat the broccoli (and tell my kids it's safe to eat)?

YANBU: Stop being sensitive, of course it'll be fine to eat.

YABU: Put it straight into the outside bin.

We grow brocolli in our back garden and I have to pick MANY whiteflies and cabbage white caterpillars off them before eating. I vote crack on!

There still seem to be hundreds of those tiny white flies around outside, even now that the weather is cooler. They're everywhere, but seem to congregate in bigger numbers around our remaining tomatoes, but not actually on them. Maybe they like the smell?

Totally normal white fly, they cover all my allotment brassicas in the winter but don't do much damage. You just have to wash them off but they'd do you no harm if you ate some. They're quite cute if you look closely, like tiny fuzzy white moths.

I grow my own vegetables and the white fly (little tiny white specks?) are absolutely rife on my broccoli, cabbages and swedes this year. They are totally harmless, just wash them off. I have to admit though, these are the sort of bugs you have to put up with when you grow your own, but I would be less impressed to find them in shop bought vegetables.

Yes this is why I don't grow brocolli.

They are the biggest pest magnets in the garden.

So if they fly off the broccoli, what happens to them. Do they land on the wall? I feel very queasy about this, I love broccoli

@CrikeyNumpty I opened the window in hope and I choose to assume that all of the ones in the kitchen left the house.

Most of them came off in the garden, though.

A while ago I brought the broccoli in, cut it up and submerged each piece in salted water. Just a couple more flies came off.

I'll probably cook it tomorrow.