random curiosity

[ratcreature]

I am curious: When you are cooking, and tasting things, how careful are you not to get any of your saliva into the food? I.e. do you always meticulously use two spoons, or are there circumstances when you don't bother and put the same spoon you had in your mouth in contact with the food again?

Poll #2231 slobber poll

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 52

View Respondents

How do you taste food when cooking?

View Answers

I always use two spoons, anything else would be unhygienic/disgusting/getting into bad habits...
1 (1.9%)

I only use two spoons when I cook for others, I don't bother when I'm cooking just for myself, and I'm the only one eating the food anyway.
14 (26.9%)

It depends on some other circumstances (like cooking for family vs. guests, whether I'm sick and potentially infectious,...)
20 (38.5%)

I never bother using extra spoons, such a tiny amount of saliva transfer has never harmed anyone.
17 (32.7%)

Comments

[glockgal]

Please also note that I NEVER cook for others when I'm sick, period. :D

Also, it goes the other way around. If I'm at someone's house and they taste something and use the same spoon, I don't care either. Saliva is the least offensive effluvium of the human body, for me!

[ratcreature]

Yeah, I'm not bothered either, especially as with a spoon it's more a residual thing, and not like someone spitting in your food. Though when I cook for guests I try to remember to use an extra spoon.

[draigwen]

While I don't normally believe anything I see on Mythbusters, they tested 'double dipping' to see how many germs transfered into dips when you dip food that's already been in your mouth. It pretty conclusively showed that very little germs transfer into the food and that there's actually more germs in the food you're dipping into than will get transfered. I figure it's the same with tasting from a spoon.

I suppose I might use two spoons if my nose was streaming and I was cooking for anyone other than my other half. But the chances of cooking for anyone else is slim anyway, and I doubt I'd offer to cook if that ill!

[ratcreature]

Yeah, I think it is more of a mental "ick!" rather than a true hygiene concern. Personally I'm more worried about avoiding rat hairs in food, which somehow end up in everything, even though mine are not allowed anywhere near the kitchen, and don't actually seem to shed all that much. And yet.

[gnatkip]

I'm so horrified by that possibility! Although for me it's cat hair. I use an apron not to protect my clothes from food, but to protect the food from my clothes. >.< For just me, I don't mind that much *she says as she brushes a hair from the rim of her coffee cup* but when cooking for other people, ack!

[musesfool]

As someone allergic to cats, I always have a bit of a freakout moment when I eat at someone's house and they have cats, even though I take allergy medication before I go.

[ratcreature]

So eating pet hair is worse for someone with allergies than transfer from furniture and clothes and such?

[musesfool]

I have no idea. It just freaks me out more that it could be IN MY FOOD.

[ratcreature]

Yes, when it is just me I'm not that bothered either, as I'm in close contact with my rats anyway, but it is really not so great in food for others.

[draigwen]

We have more of a problem with my own hair than rat hair. Even though our rats pass through the kitchen (to get to the bathroom which we find a great place to get them used to us away from the cage) their hair doesn't seem to get onto things. Occasionally I get little white hairs on my clothes, but that's only very occasional.

Fortunately my hair has only ever ended up in my boyfriend's food and no-one else's! But again, that's probably more to do with the fact that I try to steer clear of cooking for anyone but the two of us.

[ratcreature]

Yeah, human hair can be a problem too, but mine is currently long, so I can tie it back and I notice any stray hair threatening to get into stuff more easily than the short rat hair. Just last week I found a rat hair in the apple pie I had baked...

[brownbetty]

Yeah, this. My hair gets everywhere, and although there's more dog hair by volume, my hair is longer, and much more likely to be noticed, or choked on, so it's way grosser.

[draigwen]

I probably shouldn't admit to this but when I left my old flat several years ago they asked if we'd been keeping a dog. We were pretty bad at vacuuming and my hair was long at the time and got very matted in the rug in the hallway - and they thought it was dog hair. It was very embarrassing!

Anyway... that's enough about hair... :)

[brownbetty]

I would have said “Yes! Yes I did!” rather than admit to excessive shediness (which I also suffer from.)

I've been wondering about your icon, until I thought to mouseover for alt-text. I thought it was perhaps Hebrew in a very stylized font. /oblivious.

[shadowvalkyrie]

I know most people don't bother (my mom's all "Whatever, we're family!" for instance, and I've once seen a professional TV cook do it), but I find redipping used spoons etc pretty damn disgusting. One of the things I like best about cooking for myself since I've moved out: sanitary food! (But I agree with what you said in the comments: it's more of an automatic ICK! reaction, not a true health concern.) But then I'm always weird about these things; I don't share straws, glasses, or bottles with friends, either, if I can avoid it, even if none of them is ill, and the beverage in question is alcoholic enough to kill all germs, anyway. It's an irrational, yet strong disgust.

But since I only cook for myself, of course I re-dip. *g* (I also drink from milk/juice etc cartons and soda/beer bottles, knowing that it keeps my room mates from ganking my stuff from the fridge.)

[ratcreature]

I'm surprised by the tv cook.

The few instances I helped with communal cooking, and cooked for strangers, I was much more careful not to do potentially gross things. Also more careful about hand washing such, than when I just cook for myself.

[brownbetty]

It depends on if I remember right from the start, because I'm absent minded, but I'm committed to it in theory.

[ratcreature]

I'm familiar with that theory-practice gap as well.

[brownbetty]

Although, actually:

I have a related food squick which is nearly spinal, which is using personal cutlery which has already been used on a communal condiment. Like buttering one's toast, and then reaching back for more butter with the same knife.

I know it's because my mom's a celiac, and we were trained early on to never ever get crumbs in things, but it's somehow ended up this huge squick of mine that has nothing to do with whether or not there's a celiac at the table.

[ratcreature]

I find that gross when someone has other stuff on the knife and gets it into things, even if it is not much, or not even visible. In particular when it is meat stuffs. Like someone using a knife to on the butter that was also used to spread sausage or cut up fish, or any of the foods I don't eat.

[brownbetty]

Types of food should be kept seperate!

Actually, people who put everything on their plate without attempt to segregate by type are a little gross to me, too. Like, it's okay to put gravy on your mashed potatoes, but if you make no attempt to keep the gravy out of your peas, you are a mildly wrong-type-person.

[hugglewolf]

I don't cook that much (mainly cos I can't LOL) but when I do it's usually for me and mum so I don't bother with switching spoons.

[ratcreature]

There seem to be fewer people concerned about saliva on spoons than I would have thought.

[sholio]

My answer isn't on the poll -- I do use the same spoon, but I rinse it after tasting. Actually, I rinse it after stirring too, and I've never been really sure why I do that, but the sink is right at my elbow, so that's my routine: stir, turn, rinse, put down spoon, do something else for awhile. *g* And the same is true if I've used it to taste something.

[ratcreature]

My stove is opposite to the sink, so that never occurred to me as an option.

[sholio]

I did go ahead and put down that it depends on different situations, because I *am* more concerned about hygiene when I'm cooking for friends/strangers than when I'm just cooking for myself and my family. At least if they can see me cooking it. *g* Or, like the poll said, when I'm ill.

[darkrose]

I used to use separate spoons, because my mother was fanatical about it. Most of the time, though, I'm cooking for myself or for Ruth and me, and I figure it's not that big of a deal.

[ratcreature]

Yeah, it seems only a minority is truly squicked by it.

[iamza.livejournal.com]

If the food's just for me, I don't care, but if I'm planning on sharing, I use two spoons...or at least wash the one I used to taste the food before sticking it back in the pot. But I also chuck groceries based on the 'use by' date, and measure everything as per the recipe. And cook as little as possible, so, uh, 'results not typical' might apply.

[ratcreature]

I actually try to remember to use a second spoon when I cook for others too.