Day: December 7, 2017

 

 

 

 

 

Always wash your fruit and veggies.  Food safety is people safety.

My kids have asked me why I wash their fruit, especially if I am going to peel it, an orange, or cut it, an apple.

For safety, I say.  Food safety.  Which isn’t really true.  To make the food safe for them.  Kid safety.

Now and again we read salad made scores of people sick. Recently in Oregon and Washington, customers purchasing store cut melon were sickened by salmonella. There is a safe bet to be made that the fruit was not washed well before being cut.

I have worked in grocery stores and in at least one major chain there is a procedure which includes a fruit wash for anything being cut, including cukes. The food is to be washing in the solution for the prescribed time and drained. This is supposed to be done with the strawberries used as fresh garnish in the bakery as well.

Since we cannot see pathogens on the skins of melons or oranges we must wash them off. Even more disgusting than that is who touched that fruit before you bought it and where has that hand been?

So, wash your fruit. I used dish soap, a drop, or veggie wash when we have it, to wash away the things I can’t see. When you cut through a melon, the knife comes in contact with the outside and then drags with it to the inside all that yuck. Even an easy peel orange risks contamination since your fingers are on the outside, then the inside.

Wash your food. The seconds it takes and the looks you’ll get are pittance compared to the agony which might follow. It’s not a certainty someone will get sick, but boy howdy!, if it happens, that’s bad. Do good. Here is a link to an article about the OR and WA issue.