Topics: Food and Drink, Science
Experts have shared an important warning about washing fruit before eating it, pointing out there’s one huge issue we’re not realising.
Cleaning your fruit and veg has been an unexpected topic recently, after it was revealed some people have been whacking theirs in the dishwasher.
Yes, really.
The debate fired up when TikToker Lara (@larad_official) posted a video of her mother loading up the dishwasher with a variety of fruit and veg, including carrots, celery, tomato and dragon fruit.
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When a confused Lara tells her the dishwasher is for, well, dishes, her mum replies: “No, it can clean my vegetable and fruit with vinegar.
"I think I feel more clean because so many people are touching [the produce].”
While some felt it sounded like a ‘genius’ idea, others were sceptical.
An official from the US’ Food and Drug Administration (FDA) told Today it wasn’t a great idea, saying: “The FDA does not recommend utilizing kitchen appliances, such as the dishwasher, to wash produce safely and effectively.
“The FDA only recommends washing produce thoroughly under running water.”
Luke LaBorde, a Professor of Food Science at Penn State University, also agreed: “There is a variety of vegetables; some don’t need much washing, others such as root crops could require more vigorous cleaning.
“Cool running water from the faucet is the recommendation for cleaning produce in the kitchen.”
But a new study has revealed that people should proceed with caution even when washing produce the old school way.
You see, while it might be an effective way of cleaning any dirt or bacteria off, researchers found that it doesn’t actually remove pesticides.
Using Raman imaging technology to see how pesticides affected apples, the team – who published their work in the American Chemical Society’s journal Nano Letters – found that the ‘distribution of pesticides in the apple peel and pulp layers confirming that the pesticides penetrate the peel layer into the pulp layer’.
“Thus, the risk of pesticide ingestion from fruits cannot be avoided by simple washing other than peeling,” they wrote.
So what's the solution? Well, if pesticides are able to get into the peel, it’s pretty simple: peel the fruit, something that’s thankfully pretty easy to do.
The authors added that their research didn’t aim to scare anyone about pesticides, more so that they wished to help guide others on how to avoid them should they wish.
