Before biting into a piece of fruit from the supermarket, you should always wash it off, right? And this is primarily to get rid of residual pesticides, right?
But if all it takes is a quick rinse, then that stuff can’t be very effective on the tree after it rains. But if it’s more waterproof, then fruit needs be washed a little more thoroughly, right?
I don’t know about pesticides, but the reason I was fruit before I eat it is because it’s damn dirty - it’s been sitting outside for weeks/months before being picked, and then in transit and storage.
Quick rinse? Who wants to handle and eat dripping wet fruit? Quick rinse AND WIPE DRY. Then it’s pleasant to deal with, and you’ve accomplished something.
Depends on the fruit. Strawberries you can do this right before you eat them, keep the tops on then wash them, cut the tops off and eat them. If you wash them when you get home they will get waterlogged and lose flavor. I believe the same is true of most of the berries and cherries.
The general rule over here is if you can peel it, then you don’t have to wash it.
Make sure you don’t use that rule for things you have to cut (ie melons). Any contaminants on the skin will be dragged through the fruit.
Pesticides are just one reason to wash the fruit. As ArmenE mentioned, it’s really dirty from being outside (birds don’t usually have neighborly bathroom habits), it’s been picked, stored and handled. What I buy is usually in the open bins of the produce section where everybody and his dog picks it up to check it for bruising and the like. Then it goes into a shopping cart where meat from the last customer has dripped, a kid’s dirty shoes or bottom has been, etc…yeah, it’s a good idea to run a vegetable brush and some water over it before eating.
Here is a link to a report that NPR did on the effectiveness of various fruit-washing methods. As you will see, the best results were acheived through use of a dilluted vinegar spray (3 parts water to 1 part vinegar) followed by a rinse with pure water. I have used this method for a little while, and there is no effect on the taste of the fruit (so long as the rinse is thorough).
Forget pesticides–I don’t need Hepatitis A, e. coli, etc. I’ve never heard “quick rinse.” I’ve always heard “wash thoroughly and dry.” In countries where I want to eat a raw fruit or vegetable but am not acustomed to local ambient flora, I wash them in cold boiled water with a teaspoon of bleach, cold boiled water rinse, and air dry. I’ve never had obvious trouble, shall we say.
I assume (and hope) you’re joking. The tiny amount of surface grime that will be “dragged through the fruit” is absolutely negligible.
When you watch supermarket employees pick up fallen fruit off the floor and put them back onto the pile, you understand the real reason for washing fruit.
And people who go to the store sick, sneezing and coughing their way through the bin of peaches for the best ones.
The famous food poisoning outbreak in Spain back in the early 1980’s was originally put down to contaminated cooking oil.
Further work on this shows there were a lot of vested interests, and the most likely culprit was tomatoes that had been covered with organo-phosphate insecticides.
This killed around 1000 people, and left tens of thousands with severe effects for a long time aftwerwards, some will never fully recover.
You should also know that organo-phosphates are a significant part of nerve agents such as Sarin so any improper usage is likely to be nasty.
Reading the second article convinces me that I should wash raw fruit and vegetables.
Sorry, no joke. Grime isn’t the concern, bacteria is the concern. However, much of this concern seems to stem from a single case where e. coli from meat contaminated the outside of a watermelon, which then contaminated the flesh of the watermelon when it was cut. Lots of people got sick. I don’t know if there are cases of melon being contaminated “in the wild.”
We’d probably lose our food dealers licensce if we told that to the health inspector. All of our cut produce MUST be sanitized in a bleach solution of between 100 and 200ppm before it get’s cut for exactly this reason. On top of that, cantaloups and other melons with rough skin have to be scrubbed.
That Sizzler is right up the block from us. In fact I think they may have even bought the watermelon from our store. (I’d like to remention that it was decided it was cross contamination, we didn’t sell them a contaminated watermelon).
(Sidenote 1. The mother of the kid who dies, just died a few years ago of melonoma
Sidenote 2. They need to rip that place down and start over. Since the Sizzler closed, it’s been at least 4 other restaurants all of whom have also since closed, I would guess it’s due to the stigma attached to it)
Always cut your fruits and veggies with a clean knife.
There is grime on fresh fruits and vegetables from the grocery. Try rinsing a container of grapes or a head leaf lettuce in a large white or light-colored bowl and you’ll see it collect on the bottom. It’s not a lot, but it’s there. And the water itself will be dirty, too.
And I slice through the fruit, melon or veg many times. I cut my grapefruit into many thin pieces, dragging the unknown toxins from the outside into what you eat…unwashed.
I usually just rub the fruit on my pants but sometimes not. I’ll have to forget that I started reading this the next time I take a bite. I doubt that I’ll go through the mess of washing with vinegar or sulfuric acid or whatever.
I’m a risk taker, what can I say?