[Closed] Do you wash salad/fruit etc?

I considered this back in [url= http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/do-i-need-a-salad-spinner-washing-salad-content ]January last year[/url]. Ended up buying a cheap salad spinner.

Used it once.

It's with Jesus now.

I'm going to say no and then never check this thread again - if there's a reason to wash it I'd rather not know.

I always wash fruit/salad, not because of insecticides - although that is a serious consideration - but because of what those picking the fruit might have on their hands! 🙂

Always wash.

Never.

Never

Had a client who was a fruit importer/grader for the big supermarkets. Advice was "believe me, if you knew what was used on this stuff (chemical wise) you WOULD wash it". That was good enough for me. Washing only takes a few seconds. Haven't grown any extra limbs or had any body parts fall off so must be working.

salad and fruit has packaging now?

Soak in a sink full of water with a few drops of grapefruit seed extract. Or spray liberally with Muc Off.

Mushrooms I just wipe the dirt off. Not sure if that's healthy but hasn't killed me yet.

Oh, I forgot to mention, I do still wash my plums.

Ah, my coat! Bye now!

Always. I work for one of the big pub companies and the majority of our fresh fruit and veg has to be sanitised before we use it.

It isn't so much about the pesticides, more the fertilizers. There's the small risk that they're spraying ecoli all over your salad.

Always wash it, always. It makes no difference if the packet says "washed ready to eat" because I just don't believe it. I have seen inside a packing salad shed (nr Arelsford, Hants) and the machines they use wash tons of the stuff, but they do put through only 1st washed salad into the fully washed salad if they've got orders to fulfil.
We have gone through 2 salad spinners in the last 7mths, damn things are rubbish these days.

Does rinsing under the tap count as washing ?
The accepted wisdom is that hands need anti-bacterial soap.
Is plain water good enough for salad ?

Bleach does the job.

no

Strawberries were shite, might have added a bit of flavour if they'd had a squirt of fairly liquid!

So to those that say they never wash, do you not eat stuff like celery?
It's always full of dirt.

Had a client who was a fruit importer/grader for the big supermarkets. Advice was "believe me, if you knew what was used on this stuff (chemical wise) you WOULD wash it

And you believed him. Don't you think that just maybe he was telling an urban myth. Just how would the be able to sell food if it was covered in chemicals?

So to those that say they never wash, do you not eat stuff like celery?

Wash it in what? Rinse it in a bit of water? Fairly sure most produce is sprayed down with water anyway. So bit of a waste of time.

Celery, just brush off any loose soil and dip it in hummus. Survived so far.

I rinse stuff if it's got dirt on it (like mushrooms) but if it looks clean I don't bother.

Wash it in what? Rinse it in a bit of water? Fairly sure most produce is sprayed down with water anyway. So bit of a waste of time.

Very much this. As if you could wash 'e-coli' off with a quick rinse!.

Totally depends what I buy and from where. Pre washed and prepared supermarket salad generally not. Things like whole lettuce or anything from organic market stall yes. Often a few bugs but in reality they won't kill you. Supermarket fruit is often sprayed with pesticide for bugs and wax to make to look shiny, best to give it a wash or at least a quick rub on your shirt.

The gf bought some lovely cep mushrooms from an organic producer, then took a while cutting them into pieces and soaking them in vinegar, it was amazing the amount of bugs which emerged. The mushrooms where very tasty btw.

EDIT you wash stuff to take chemicals off, to remove grit / soil and insects. It's a bit of a sad world that we are so used to supermarket ready to eat produce. Vegetables like lettuce have to have individual leaves washed, so if you buy a whole lettuce the inside cannot have been washed and if there are no bugs it's because of lots of pesticide used in the production

Never wash salad, veg or fruit.

The only thing I'm tempted to rinse are leeks as they often have sandy grit near the tops, but I've actually never bothered, most of it comes out in the pan, and the last bit won't do anyone any harm.

I would like to think my attitude to this has contributed to my superhuman immune system, although it's equally as likely I'm just storing up loads of superbugs in my system that are going to all strike at once and I'll explode.

Looking forward to finding out which it is though !

@neal for leeks you can cut off the tops (make good soup with those) then holding root end put knife in vertically and run up to top end. Rotate 90 degrees then do same then wash the quartered fan (held together by root end) and then cut up as required - as you say it's just generally a bit of sand like soil though.

Sounds like the best way of cleaning them, but to be honest, I don't think I will be bothering

I'm looking forward to the potential superbug explosion too much now

Stuff I grow gets well soaked as all the ****ing cats consider our veg patch a toilet.
There's tons of bugs floating on the surface after a few minutes in the sink.
If it says wash on the pack I do.

I polish apples on my overalls like I'm Bob Willis warming up at the Pavilion End.

I don't wash, well apart from if it's obviously got mud and bugs on it.

Any chemicals that have been on it aren't going to nicely sit on the surface waiting for you to wash them off, they'll be within the plant by the time you touch it. Likewise e-coli, assuming that you've got the nasty ones on there, then washing will reduce the quantity but not enough to stop it causing problems, and realistically it's as likely to come from your hands as any other source.

I suspect the reason it says 'wash' is much along the lines of 'may contain nuts'

I used to work on the produce section at a Tesco. I always give fruit and veg a wash.

I wash the stuff whenever I can be bothered. I wash fruit in the office with hand soap and water because the filthy animals I work with grope every bit of fruit before choosing and very few wash their hands after pissing.

This whole minefield could be avoided by just having a Mars Bar.

Yes -when I was kid there was a summer industry picking berries and I remember some of what went on and some of the the manky minks that worked in the berry fields.

Just potatoes, and sometimes lettuce/celery if there proper dirt on it. Other than that nah, cba.

I used to work on an organic carrot farm and trust me you want to wash them! think I read somewhere that salad bags cause a significant proportion of food poisoning.

Always wash stuff. Not bothered by dirt, but bioaccumulation of pesticides doesn't sound like fun. And I've been in a wholesale greengrocers warehouse, it was hardly a pleasant and clean place.
Washing doesn't take long really. Not sure why you wouldn't.

@drac: Interesting interpretation of urban myth source. You really believe we are sold chemically free fruit and veg??

[url= http://abcnews.go.com/m/story?id=13831054 ]Radioactive zombie rhubarb and other fruit/vege nasties.....[/url]

Apologies for US source but vaguely relevant.

When I want to back up my argument, I always go for a 3 year old article, from a US website, which relates to that countries agriculture setup.

Surely for the veg to have pesticides on it it would have to not have rained between the application of pesticides and harvesting, which seems unlikely. I seem to remember hearing from a farmer that they were only sprayed once fairly early on so pesticides should have been washed off.

As for dirt, just think how much of that ends up in your mouth whilst MTBing 🙂 Not sure how much pesticide is IN the veg anywy. Is there any such thing as systemic pesticide?

I picked apples for a month in Northern Italy during the early nineties. The orchards were sprayed with pesticide twice a week which covered the trees completely. My eyes and nose were running constantly and had to wear gloves to pick the fruit
Washing fruit and veg is now second nature!

You really believe we are sold chemically free fruit and veg??

No just not harmful.

Thanks for the American article on american food.

Deep fry, it's the only way to be certain.

@Jamie: you should probably mention the vaguely relevant thing too then when you do. Otherwise you get really helpful people wasting their valuable time having to flag it up.

Do get any (so called fresh) fruit and veg from the US. Nowt has changed in three years. Most of the UK "fresh" food is sourced from outside the UK, how does it get to your supermarket looking so good?

This happened just along the road from me... Think I'll start washing veg now :/
[url= http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/01/28/sentencing-of-colorado-cantaloupe-farmers/4958671/ ]yikes[/url]

Do get any (so called fresh) fruit and veg from the US. Nowt has changed in three years. Most of the UK "fresh" food is sourced from outside the UK, how does it get to your supermarket looking so good?

They invented a thing called a fridge not sure it was in the last 3 years though, they also pick it before it's ripe and then there's the packing in nitrogen.

Yes Drac of course they do and fridges are specifically designed to neutralise pesticide residues. Seriously though given the possibilities of contamination on the farm and the extended supply chain, a bit of a wash is a good idea.

I only wash bananas and oranges.

think I read somewhere that salad bags cause a significant proportion of food poisoning.

I think I read somewhere that they don't.

Hope that helps.

how does it get to your supermarket looking so good?

Other than the perfectly good reasons above, there are also specifically selected varieties that are designed to travel well, that way they don't ripen fully before they are ready to be sold.

(It's why you can only buy one variety of banana in the UK. Saw it on TV last night)

Seriously though given the possibilities of contamination on the farm and the extended supply chain, a bit of a wash is a good idea.

They're washed before packing too and it's more than a bit of a wash, a bit of a wash at home isn't going to remove the pesticide if it's been through all that packing process.

Wasn't there some seroius bean sprout poisoning recently?

I don't really bother unless it's got soil on.

Did see someone sneeze into hand, than start choosing apples in local supermarket once. But I'm still too lazy to bother.

Wasn't there some seroius bean sprout poisoning recently?

There was some bacterial problem last year but you can only guess if people washed before eating or not.

We don't wax fruit and veg here either. They do in the US, it's really obvious, the apples look like snooker balls.

Yes - always wash for pesticide/ fertiliser reasons if bought from a supermarket and to get the mud/ animals off if from ours or someone elses garden.

Lettuce's get soaked in salted water - makes the slugs die and float to the top. Always something amusing about that for some reason... 🙂

I get my veg from the allotment, I have to wash it. My wife had a fit when I was preparing the Brussels and she saw how many creepy crawlies came off it.

I picked apples for a month in Northern Italy during the early nineties. The orchards were sprayed with pesticide twice a week which covered the trees completely. My eyes and nose were running constantly and had to wear gloves to pick the fruit
Washing fruit and veg is now second nature!

I just stick all my fruit and veg in the dishwasher on a rinse cycle as soon as I get back from the supermarket.
Saves any worry.

No, I can't be arsed. I very rarely get ill, so I can only deduce that this has given me a superhuman immune system.

No, I can't be arsed. I very rarely get ill, so I can only deduce that this has given me a superhuman immune system.

See potential alternative superbug/exploding scenario above.

I've just eaten a salad, didn't wash any of it. If I don't report back later today I'd start washing. Happy to be of service.

I wash my plums.

Well it's not looking good for Prawny.

I'm still here!!!! Just prepped another one, no washing, nails me.

God knows where the last two days went mind.

Zombieeeeeee!