How to keep your food prep clean - observations about TV advice (IV.)

[taxlady]

Here's my last crabby post about the food safety lady on TV.

Another suggestion was colour-coded cutting boards. Red for raw meat, yellow for poultry, green for fruits and veggies, and black for cooked or ready to eat. She also prefers plastic because of the cut marks you get on wood.

She didn't mention the cut marks on plastic. It's kind of controversial, which is better, wood or plastic. But, there was a study at the University of California (Davis) that shows that wood is safer: Food Safety: Comparing Plastic and Wood Cutting Boards By Dean O. Cliver, Ph.D. I have heard of other studies with similar results. I don't know this for sure, but I think she hasn't studied it and is just using "common sense" and what other "experts" say.

She owns five cutting boards. They didn't look very big. I have five white plastic cutting boards (three small, two large) and a wooden board. I don't want mine colour coded - I have a dishwasher. I just put the meat and poultry boards in the dishwasher as soon as I'm done with them. I might need another vegi board while the first one is dirty. Without colour coding, I just grab a clean white one. Yeah, I think wood would be better, but I still have an ingrained prejudice in favour of plastic. I guess the next one will be wood. The last three were cheap at a yard sale.

Comments

[tygrbabe.livejournal.com]

wood is better because it's naturally antibacterial but plastic is fine as long as you either replace them when they get too cut up or soak them in water with bleach once in awhile (in most commercial kitchens it's done once a week). also, my problem with colored boards is that you can't see when they're dirty or stained which i believe is why they're not used in commercial kitchens.

[taxlady.livejournal.com]

yeah, according to that study, the wooden ones are still good when they are cut up.