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

[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.