Supermarket chain Sainsbury’s has apologised after a local historian and author found an orange and white capsule in his porridge.

Mr Broadhead, of Hilmarton, ordered a packet of Sainsbury’s Scottish Oats as part of a home delivery in December and started eating it just before Christmas.

Three days after he opened the packet, he discovered the pill in his bowl, partially dissolved in the milk.

He rang the Sainsbury’s customer service helpline, which advised him to hand the porridge over to staff at his local branch in Calne and said they would send it off for testing.

He also received two identical letters from the customer services team, dated December 23 and December 24.

The letters, which confirmed the porridge had been delivered to a laboratory, had the same name at the bottom, but were signed by two different people.

But Mr Broadhead, who phoned his doctor to check his health after discovering the pill, said he was disappointed by the lack of urgency shown by Sainsbury’s.

He said: “I had been eating this porridge for three days and I had a blinding headache for three days. I stopped eating it and I was fine.

“I gave them the batch number and I said, do you want to take this off the shelves? They said, ‘We don’t want to cause a panic.’ “I thought they would just take it off the shelves, but they didn’t seem bothered about it. I was quite shocked.”

However, a spokes-man for Sain-sbury’s said: “We take reports of this nature extremely seriously and we immediately carried out a thorough investigation with independent experts.

“This found no evidence that contamination like this could occur, as our oats are heated to a high temperature, rolled and sieved before being securely packaged. We have apologised to Mr Broadhead and have withdrawn any oats packaged at that time.”

Mr Broadhead has now received a telephone call from a representative in the director’s office, who read him a report of the findings.

He has also been offered £100 worth of food vouchers to spend at Sainsbury’s.

Mr Broadhead said: “I didn’t ask for a refund and I wasn’t looking for compensation. I was concerned there was something in the food.

“They said they have tested it and they believe it to be aspirin.”