The Five-Second Rule, V2.0
Harold McGee looks at research on the five-second rule and formulates version 2.0: "If you drop a piece of food, pick it up quickly, take five seconds to recall that just a few bacteria can make you sick, then take a few more to think about where you dropped it and whether or not it’s worth eating."
I employ the five-second rule at my apartment and other people's houses, and for food that's fallen into my lap; everywhere else is pretty much a no-eat zone.
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5 Comments:
You must have some clean friends. With some of mine, I'm afraid to eat something from their kitchen that hasn't been dropped on the floor!
Adam Kuban at 2:59PM on 05/09/07
See, that's the thing -- there is no bacteria-free place. Unless you live in a cleanroom, there is bacteria in the air, bacteria on the plates you just washed (assuming the sanitizer/bleach/hydrogen peroxide has dried and dissipated), bacteria already in your mouth... The only difference between the floor and the plate is the amount and diversity of bacteria. I'd be more worried about it picking up a hair or gravel than the thin chance that it gathered some dangerous bacterium.
me3dia at 5:06PM on 05/09/07
How much bacteria sticks to the food also depends on whether the food you drop is a piece of moist chicken or a piece of dry biscuit. The moist food will have more bacteria sticking to it.
yich at 8:00PM on 05/09/07
If you think about it, unless you always take your shoes off at your door& have some sort of shoe removal agreement with your friends, your floors &thiers have been everywhere those shoes have been. Public restrooms, sidewalks that have just had dogpoo scooped off them, I,m sure I could think of scenarios for human blood, urine, feces, vomit.... but I'm freaking myself out...I too have used the 5 second rule it's amazing I'm alive to ....Oh I feel weak.............
peticook at 2:29PM on 05/10/07
More on the Five-Second Rule.
me3dia at 5:31PM on 05/21/07