I’ll do (a), for a couple of reasons, although generally if it’s take out for a group, we’ll serve out of the restaurant containers. I don’t generally “decant” (like that term) the food onto serving platters before serving. But I like eating off of real plates and using real forks and knives.
As for (b), that would make me itch. We were taught to put the food away promptly after a meal, and it would make me a bit nuts to see it left out. But I guess it doesn’t hurt anything, since he says he’s never gotten sick, and I agree that you need to pick your battles.
Trust me, give him this because it is a small battle. When you redecorate that is when you need the big guns. You can then tell him"I gave in to your quirky eating habits, we are getting the god damned Cathedral cabinets".
Why would he care what kind of cabinets are in the kitchen? That’s the woman’s place and where she’ll be spending her time, why shouldn’t she decorate it to suit herself?
D&R
Seriously though, SO and I spend about the same amount of time cooking and I really wouldn’t care what the cabinets looked like. When we go to Lowe’s the counters I like best are the ones closest to me. Not quite that simplistic I suppose, but I wouldn’t spend more than 30 minutes making a decision on my own. I’d only dig in if she decided that retro 70s was the perfect look.
Cabinets are the small battle, it’s when it’s time to get a car that I’ll want the big guns… “You got the cathedral cabinets, We’re getting the Humvee!”
Well, comme ci, comme ca. The house is important to me, the car may be important to some guys. If it gets us to where we want to go with minimal gassage, that’s cool. I don’t need a status mobile. I want my house to look nice, and that is where I pick my battles.
Well, Audrey, I guess from those church suppers you didn’t learn your lessons against fornicating (whoosh)
But anyhoo, I do the same thing and my wife gets on me about it. To steal from George Carlin, that’s why I have an immune system: to kill germs. But it needs practice…
Czarcasm, I would be happy to…how do you edit a thread title though? Help. (Or another Doper who knows how…)
I think Some User Name and Campion and a few others are thinking that this debate is a serious one between my BF and I. It isn’t. Otherwise I would’ve titled the thread “Settle Our Argument!”
It’s a friendly debate, not an argument. I don’t eat the food he leaves out but I don’t care that he does; obviously it works for him.
I just never met anybody before who routinely leaves food out for hours on end, so I was wondering if I’m the minority or he is.
If this were an actual argument between he and I, then I would definitely agree that it’s a terribly lame thing upon which to"take a stand!"
As usual, the Dopers have been enlightening; there are a lot more of you who leave food out the way he does than I’d have guessed. Also a lot more of you who eat takeout on dinner plates than I’d have estimated. I guess I’m just lazy!
And for those of you who mentioned pizza…even I will eat relatively ancient pizza. I guess my justification has always been that you buy pepperoni at room temperature, so it likes being at room temperature.
Oh, and Musicat asked about his 3 second rule…no. If it hits the floor it goes into the trash.
What is cute and charming now, and the subject of a friendly debate, will be endlessly annoying and the subject of a no-holds-barred argument in ten years. I’m just saying.
I once visited a friend whose family left most of Thanksgiving dinner, including what was left of the turkey, out on the counter overnight and continued to eat from it the next day. This was in Texas, so not one of those situations where ambient temperature was like a refrigerator. The only thing I ate the next day was Jello. My friend and her brother did survive to adulthood, though.
I think those who have had food poisoning get a healthy fear about this stuff.
3-second rule - TRASH! no ands, ifs, or buts about it! :dubious:
I dont put things away in the fridge right away either. My Mom did this, as well as my g’ma and it seemed like I was ALWAYS getting tummy aches as a kid if I ate anywhere else. When I got older, had my own place, I was lax about the “one hour rule” and eventually got over the ailments. However, I WILL NOT eat pizza that’s been sitting out overnight - or eat pizza out of the fridge that’s a week old!*
*I leave that up to my gaming buds, who dont seem to care - pizza is pizza, they say!
a) I agree with you. Unnecessary dirtying of dishes, and a bit odd, perhaps, but harmless.
b) Doesn’t freak me out, but I’d feel uneasy about it and wouldn’t do it.
I’ve never had food poisoning.
On one occasion, I made two small frozen entrees in the oven: something I’ve forgotten, and mac and cheese. I had the something, but I was full and just forgot about the mac and cheese. I didn’t remember it until the next time I went to use the oven - 2 days later. I said, “Oh, shit.” Then I thought, cooked in the oven - all bacteria dead - and cheese doesn’t go bad after 2 days. So I reheated it in the microwave and ate it. It was no worse than reheated pizza, and I didn’t get sick.
Chinese food is served on actual dinnerware, but burgers, sandwiches, other carry-out foods are eaten over the wrappers/containers. I’m the dishwasher operator in our house, and I have plenty to do already.
I’m not very picky about food being left out for 6-8 hours, unless it contains mayo or eggs. I’ll re-heat pizza that’s been out all night. I’ve had food poisoning in the past, but never from food at my house. I’ll sometimes eat food that’s been dropped on the floor, because I know about how clean my floor is, on any given day.
What bugs me is when one of my mother-in-laws serves dinner at 2, and nobody sits down eat until 3:30, when everything is cold. Cold, clumpy mashed potatoes, congealed gravy, cold vegetables, solidified stuffing, bleah. In the summer, it’s cold burgers, liquefied potato salad, and soupy pasta salad. I don’t eat a lot at her house.
A) is no big deal to me, one way or the other.
B) is no big deal to me, one way or the other, if it’s just a couple of hours. Left out overnight is where I draw the line. In winter here though, I might give it more leeway - we keep our house so cold that the butter I have out on the kitchen counter is pretty firm.
Just a note on food poisoning - it’s not always the bacteria that will get you, but the toxins they have created, and those aren’t destroyed by heat. Your best friend is probably the saying “When in doubt, throw it out.” Anything discoloured or smelling off goes in the trash automatically.
As for food on the floor, if mine wasn’t covered in cat hair all the time, I wouldn’t care about picking stuff up and eating it. As it is, I just wash it off and eat it if I can. I’m not floor picky.
However, I don’t fear the mayo. Actually, since most people don’t make their own mayo, generally it’s the chicken or the eggs in the church salads that is going to get you. Mayo comes sterilized. Chicken and eggs come teeming with billions of little critters. And the raw veggies too!
Me, I eat it anyway. I am convinced that growing up in my father’s home imbued our family with a acquired immunity to botulism, e. coli, and Salmonella.
You are undoubtedly correct. It is a depressing thought. Most things, left to themselves, degenerate. I am sure that I will not be as thin, and definitely not as unlined, by the time I hit my 39th birthday.
But I do hope that if I marry my current BF–the one who lives dangerously on six-hour-old takeout! --that we will not be arguing about the fact that he’s eating that sandwich he bought six hours ago.
That sandwich covered in mayo…and ham…and beef…
As long as he’s not trying to make me eat it, this debate is strictly for entertainment purposes.
I dunno. I guess perhaps I am a bit paranoid, thanks to my bout of food-poisoning years ago. I just don’t eat food that’s been sitting out. Even at potluck dinners, when I really want to, when I know that So-and-So’s chicken salad, or gumbo, or homemade ranch dressing is “so wonderful!”
If I don’t know how long it’s been there, even if other people are eating it, I just can’t bring myself to do it. I’ve undoubtedly missed out on some fabulous and most likely harmless food.
I just know that out of a family of four, my dad and I ate that potluck potato salad, and a few hours later, he had one bathroom and I had the other and neither one of us have eaten potato salad since then.
Nothing is worth going through that again.
I’m not saying it’s rational. I’m just saying I’m afraid.
