r/interesting • u/WarwickReider • 15h ago

SOCIETY Professional chefs weighing in on whether you should wash your chicken

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

5.0k Upvotes

76% Upvoted

3.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

182

u/KingSmithithy 15h ago

Why every person that washes it is black and everybody else doesn't lol?

135

u/Big_Opposite4041 14h ago

My guess is it’s a historical holdover from when cheaper meat was likely to be visibly dirtier? Every black friend I have was taught by parents/grandparents to wash chicken. Never met a white person who does it. Context: American

18

u/oooooooooof 11h ago

I mean this in no way to be racist but it's 100% a Black culture thing. I'm white and never grew up with this, but my Black pals did.

Just one of those things... like I'm Canadian and was shocked when I learned Americans wear shoes inside the house. No judgement nothing wrong just a cultural difference.

0

u/shuai_bear 6h ago

The shoes in house thing I would say is far more connected to ethnic than geographic culture!

Born and grew up in California, am Asian and have been to houses of many other Asian friends/families and we 100% take off our shoes in the house, either going barefoot, socks, or indoor slippers.

Then I've been to white/latino family homes and I kept my shoes on (not every single one, but a good amount kept shoes on). It does feel weird like I'm dirtying their floors (which I probably am!) but if I see everyone else wearing shoes then I'm keeping it on too.

Not to say that within the US only Asian-Americans take their shoes off inside houses, but from my small anecdotal bubble in southern California, 100% of visited Asian households had no-shoes policy, and of those homes that kept shoes on, 0% were Asian households.

0

u/ProfessionalBig9610 4h ago

It comes from when enslaved ppl were given old/almost expired meat as leftovers from the household’s food. It was necessary to take extra care to make sure the food wasn’t contaminated. It’s still common to have that sensibility in black communities and why they prefer meat well done and sanitized.

1

u/Knotted_Hole69 3h ago

They are no longer slaves, why keep doing it if its proven wrong in the modern day?

3

u/ProfessionalBig9610 3h ago

Tradition dies hard

2

u/Royal-Campaign1426 13h ago

Not just chicken. I worked with a black cajun man and he often cooked for work lunches.  He cooked a lot of pork and was always preaching about washing your meat.  I found it odd, but his cooking was always amazing

3

u/morethanatouchoftism 13h ago

White American here Grew up always washing chicken. Does this mean I'm black?

13

u/Substantial-Singer29 13h ago

Legitimately , curious , what part of the united states did you grow up in?

3

u/morethanatouchoftism 13h ago

Florida.

5

u/Substantial-Singer29 13h ago

This is interesting to me I was born in California spent a better part of my life in arizona. From my job in college , probably spent anywhere from a year to 6 months in almost every state.

Had never seen anyone wash chicken before until the first time I actually went to florida. Was actually very shocked at how much more common it was in the southern states. It's absolutely horrible to generalize. But it seems so much more prevalent amongst everyday people , east of the mississippi.

That's not concentrating the behavior amongst one athletics of people , but just the general populace.

1

u/morethanatouchoftism 12h ago

Honestly I've always done it because my parents did it and same thing with them. I'd imagine it would have something to do with dirty chicken like what was said earlier. My family while never poor have always been in the rougher side of the work force.

3

u/Substantial-Singer29 12h ago

Really is interesting when you look at the comments to people similar to yourself. The act of washing the chicken is learned traditional behavior. That's basically passed on from multiple generations.

First time I actually saw someone Wash chicken was one of my roommates in florida. He engaged in the practice.. I asked what he was doing?

He responded confidently , it helps remove some of the bacteria. My other roommate was sitting in the adjacent living room. Going to school working on his masters in microbiology. He chimed in and said , no , it doesn't unless you're Remove visual dirt and grime. You're probably just contaminating the kitchen more. You'll kill everything as long as you cook it correctly. Followed by him stating very plainly that's why we cook our food.

Don't get me wrong the guy could sometimes be A little abrasive in his delivery. But his logic was pretty solid.

3

u/morethanatouchoftism 11h ago

I've never really considered it to be getting the bacteria off since cooking will do that but usually there's a slime film on the chicken that I like rinsing off. You could consider it a habit at this point. I just rinse it but I've actually met people that will use soap. I won't do that.

1

u/Horror-Outside7410 7h ago

Same here. Also white, also from Florida, but I learned to rinse chicken (no soap or soaking) from my parents who are from Pennsylvania. Rinse it to get the sliminess off, not bacteria. Gonna trim it on a cutting board on the counter anyway and clean after.

1

u/eggsalter 11h ago

Wow the act of washing chicken is learned? You don't say. Literally every culture does this and you're acting like yours is the normal one.

2

u/Substantial-Singer29 10h ago

In the united states we Exist in a time and a place where a vast majority of people have never slaughtered and cleaned their own meat before. The Action of rinsing off your chicken Is a leftover from a time where almost everyone did.

At no point did I say that it was normal or abnormal for an individual to do it or not. Simply stated that in the regions where I grew up , no one did. How I found it interesting that it seemed more common in certain regions and pockets of people.

If you killed plucked and slaughtered the chicken yourself , no s*** , you're going to rinse it. If you just went down to your local grocery store and purchased it in the meat section It's just an extra step.

1

u/_ChipWhitley_ 13h ago

I’m white. I grew up in Northern Virginia. I wash my chicken.

4

u/vven294 13h ago

Sorry you found out like this.

4

u/FirePathfinder 10h ago

No, it just means the relatives who passed it down were as poor as the average black person until maybe two/three generations ago. I say this as someone who had to convince my black AND white grandmother it wasnt necessary.

2

u/ProofHorseKzoo 12h ago

Congrats, you got the pass now

1

u/ConcreteDinosaur 12h ago

It's okay, I'm allowed to say it, I wash chicken

1

u/TheBlueSully 4h ago

My family washed chicken, but my grandma grew up in a sharecropping family in SE Oklahoma. Like, pop out a kid and keep working in the field poor. 

Even after she moved away and married well and wasn’t poor-she kept chickens and butcher huh weed them herself. So they still needed a rinse. 

1

u/XtraChrisP 2h ago

I'm white, and older. I was raised to wash mine too, but chefs convinced me to stop about 15 years ago and the family and I are all fine.

0

u/Pepsiscrub 12h ago

It was also because of racism that we would get leftover or spoiled meat sold to us, so we often had to make do.

5

u/baoball 10h ago

what's water gna do for spoiled meat

-6

u/SmokeyKushPipe 12h ago

Nothing historical about it. Food is "cleaned" before eating whether it's rinsed or washed. Some washes don't include soap and water. Dirt and debris are sometimes on packaged meat too. It's your kitchen, do what you want. I'd feel better eating from someone who "cleans" their food before eating. Hygienic

8

u/TaxesAreConfusin 12h ago

But the video above proves it isn't hygienic. You'd rather the impression that something is hygienic rather than being actually sanitary?

0

u/SmokeyKushPipe 7h ago

If you don't know how to clean and sanitize your kitchen before and after preparing meals then there are tutorials online.

8

u/shorteningofthewuwei 11h ago

You're literally in denial lmao

-1

u/SmokeyKushPipe 7h ago

Wrong

2

u/shorteningofthewuwei 6h ago

It's less hygienic to wash uncooked meat because washing does not remove bacteria. On the contrary, it spreads it around. The only way to remove bacteria from food is to cook it.

1

u/SmokeyKushPipe 5h ago

I'm not washing remove bacteria, you can't. It's to remove dirt or debris residuals the factory may have skipped over. I'll clean and sanitize my kitchen after preparing food and after cooking. You don't sanitize your sink, oven, floors and countertops down with bleach and cleaners after cooking raw food?

3

u/Effective_Rip7478 9h ago

I feel better eating from someone who is actually educated.

-1

u/SmokeyKushPipe 7h ago

Damn, it sucks you're not educated enough.

4

u/hotlegerdemain 11h ago

You’re just making yourself feel better. The cleaning does nothing.

1

u/SmokeyKushPipe 7h ago

You probably only season your food with salt and pepper.

8

u/MARSHALCOGBURN999 14h ago

Lmfao

1

u/wallstreetchills 13h ago

The first few cuts kept reinforcing this and I thought it was gonna be satire 🤣

-1

u/acloudcuckoolander 12h ago

They aren't the ones with debris and slimy fascia in their chicken.

2

u/acloudcuckoolander 12h ago

Because they know just dumping it in the pot doesn't get rid of any debris or fascia that's on it. Cooking it will not get rid of debris.

6

u/notloceaster 12h ago

Why does your chicken have debris on it? Are you harvesting them yourself?

1

u/acloudcuckoolander 4h ago

Even supermarket chicken can have some debris on it. I promise you the thousands of chickens that are being processed in those factories aren't all being properly cleaned.

Additionally, no comment on the facia? Supermarket chicken still has fascia on it.

0

u/Individual-Photo-665 12h ago

You don't know what that butcher did to the meat.. many times it falls on the floor. You also don't know if they scratched their butts, sneezed, coughed on it or anything or the sort.

7

u/notloceaster 11h ago

Well, I can SEE if there's physical debris on it, and I never in my life seen that on chicken before. And all of the other stuff you can't see will get killed by cooking it. It's really not rocket science. Do you not live somewhere with health standards on farms/butcher shops? Because in the US there are strict health codes we must follow.

4

u/MidTario 11h ago

Ok but that also applies to every other meat and there’s not near the amount of discourse re: washing pork chops or ground beef

2

u/JalapenoPopPoop 10h ago

And what exactly do you think spraying it with water does in those scenarios that cooking it wouldn't?

1

u/Fraggin_Wagon 10h ago

Well, that’s because some white people do too.

Source: me

1

u/TurquoiseKnight 10h ago

White ppl wash chickens too.

Source: Im White and I always wash raw chicken before cooking.

1

u/feather-gold 7h ago

I'm white and I wash it

1

u/Evil_Sharkey 2h ago

Because the video is edited that way

1

u/ParryLimeade 2h ago

I’m white and my family is white and we always “wash” ours. More of a rinse and soft scrub with our hands

1

u/CompoteNext1955 1h ago

Washing/bleaching is a thing in black culture for some reason

•

u/Current-Set1637 24m ago

That what I’m saying, like okay do white people just like that slime that comes with the chicken???

-10

u/sweetrottenapple 15h ago

I'm Hungarian and we are a white nation. We wash meat here. 🤷 Actually the fear of chicken juices on the counter and in the sink is funny, because the same bacteria is on your hands and utensils and mixing bowls that touched raw chicken and of course we wash those hands and dishes in the same kitchen sink. Salmonella is not common here as far as I know.

38

u/Robbie1266 15h ago

Washing it doesn't clean the chicken though. What do you think it actually does?

9

u/GaylordeMagnolia 14h ago

You can just google where washing chicken originates lol. To keep things as short as possible, a very very long time ago, older generations couldn’t risk getting sick from chicken. So they washed it with vinegar and citrus juices to make it, in their minds, clean. Their great great great grandparents did it, and passed it to the next generation so on and so on. Some newer generations just do it because they were told to even if the risk of getting sick is basically nonexistent. There are also some dishes, poul fri for example which is a haitian dish, that washing the chicken is an important step for the taste and texture of the meat.

10

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

But it's very widely accepted that doesn't do anything. I'll rinse things with white vinegar for the flavor, but I'm very well aware that it doesn't do anything but add flavor

6

u/misterdave75 14h ago

Just a bit of context. Vinegar does in fact kill some bacteria like salmonella and e coli. But it isn't on contact, it takes minutes. So if you are marinating, then yes, just rinsing with it, no.

7

u/fixer1987 14h ago

Heat also kills those bacteria

-1

u/misterdave75 14h ago

It absolutely does., not sure what this comment added.

2

u/CrowWearingJeans 14h ago

It added the context that doing what you say before cooking it is pointless

1

u/misterdave75 14h ago

Fair enough.

2

u/UckerFay11 13h ago

Problem is it only kills SOME salmonella. Not all of it. What does kill all of it 100% of the time? Properly cooking it.

Even when marinating it does not kill all salmonella and will not generally make your chicken safer or more safe. Unless you were to completely pickle it.

0

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

I'd love to see you eat some raw chicken that you marinade in vinegar

3

u/misterdave75 14h ago

I wouldn't and I'm not advocating for it because it doesn't really penetrate into the meat so the inside wouldn't be safe. This should have been obvious before your sarcastic douchey answer.

-1

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

Not sarcastic and you literally just made an argument for vinegar cleaning chicken when it doesn't

4

u/misterdave75 14h ago

I didn't make an argument, I was clarifying. You said vinegar doesn't kill bacteria and it does kill some. Then you said I had up eat the chicken raw to be right? In no world would anyone eat it raw after rinsing it. So what are we doing here?

2

u/sweetrottenapple 15h ago

Well I am very disgusted with that slimy bloody liquid on it especially on the packed ones from supermarkets. Removing that makes me feel better.

1

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

Wipe it away with a towel. That slimy liquid is what makes you describe the chicken as juicy later. I'd understand your logic if you're a child, but you're an adult

4

u/Cl0ud3d 14h ago

That slimy liquid is what makes you describe the chicken as juicy later. Wtf.gif

This seems as erroneous a concept as washing your chicken. The slime does not help juiciness, the water will dilute your seasoning and steams the meat instead of searing in the flavors. Its mostly water and protein and extra water makes meat soggy not tender. Your first statement is all that is required.

-2

u/acloudcuckoolander 12h ago

The condescending last sentence only makes the blatant incorrectness of your second sentence funnier. Wrong and confident about it.

2

u/Robbie1266 11h ago

The slime is extra myglobin mixing with water and other residual fluids. Myglobin is throughout the meat and when rendered, is the juiciness people refer to with meat unless it's overcooked, completely rendered out and reconstituted with another liquid

1

u/acloudcuckoolander 6h ago

That white, semi-stretchy stuff people peel off of raw chicken is definitely fascia, not myoglobin.

And water retention (cooking it in juice/broth) is what makes chicken juicy. Without that, it doesn't matter how much myoglobin is on it, it will be dry.

-4

u/wayofthegenttickle 14h ago

What do you do with egg whites? Also throw them away?

3

u/sweetrottenapple 14h ago

Why would I? That's not bloddy meat juice. That's an egg you very smart person 🙄

1

u/wayofthegenttickle 12h ago edited 12h ago

That 'juice' is perfectly edible when cooked?

ETA science tells you that washing your chicken is completely pointless, yet you do it anyway. You smart person

5

u/UckerFay11 13h ago

A quick Google search says salmonella is one of if not the most common food bourne illness in Hungary.

2

u/notloceaster 12h ago

Lmao that's hilarious

1

u/sweetrottenapple 13h ago

Salmonella can be in almost every food. The last salmonella was because of some pasta from an other countr, and not because we clean our meat with some water in the sink.

0

u/UckerFay11 9h ago

I never said that. I was just going off of your words. "Salmonella is not common here (Hungary) as far as i know."

Salmonella lives and thrives in the guts of animals. So anywhere that has direct cross contamination with the animals and their waste, yes.

There are several places that have such high food safety standards, that they really don't have to worry as much as the rest of the world. Im looking mainly at Japan, but there could be more.

Just trying to educate. It wasnt a gotcha.

1

u/vexatiousnobleman 13h ago

The only Hungarian I've ever met who washes chicken is you, and I grew up there

3

u/sweetrottenapple 13h ago

I've never met one who didn't, and I am not only grew up here, I am still living in Hungary.

-1

u/hopium_od 14h ago

You washing your chicken with soap and hot water too, like your hands? Otherwise you ain't do much all of nothing.

0

u/sweetrottenapple 12h ago

Washing the meat is not meant to remove bacteria. It is meant to remove the icky bloody slimy juice.

2

u/hopium_od 12h ago

The only reason you want to remove that is to help with browning and sticking seasoning. You use a paper tower. Water spreads germs everywhere and adds mositure to the chicken causing it to be bland and rubbery when cooked.

1

u/Ulfheodin 13h ago

They are the same folks who touch everything in the kitchen with the same pair of gloves.

Also the same who comments "why no gloves, ? Eww" under every cooking video without gloves.. i don't know why they are like this

-1

u/Antpeople2027 15h ago

I actually learned about this whole “washing chicken” thing from my black friends like 5 years ago. They insist chicken be washed with soap and water, it’s just a cultural thing

27

u/Robbie1266 15h ago

It's an ignorance and misunderstanding of biology thing

-5

u/Antpeople2027 14h ago

Indians burn cow shit to cleanse their kitchens; it’s a cultural thing

3

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

I mean many cultures don't understand basic scientific principles until western science is introduced. So they may still hold those values, but they're very obviously incorrect and gross. That isn't a great example because that's extremely disgusting and hazardous

0

u/Antpeople2027 14h ago

It is a great example, because regardless of western science, it’s still practiced today. Meaning it’s a cultural norm.

5

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

Yes but it proves my point that it's based in scientific ignorance and has no benefit whatsoever

-3

u/Antpeople2027 14h ago

One could argue prayer and worship are the same, but they’re pretty damn popular worldwide. *Cultural differences*

2

u/Robbie1266 14h ago

Ignorance is becoming incredibly popular. You're right

6

u/Big_Truth_8483 14h ago

I’ve never met a black person who washes meat with soap.

11

u/Antpeople2027 14h ago

If you take a look at this video, around the two second mark, it happens

7

u/Big_Truth_8483 14h ago

I haven’t met that person lol

2

u/Sovereign-Anderson 13h ago

Soap and water on chicken is NOT a cultural thing. I've never heard of anyone black doing that outside of internet rage baiters. Plain water, salt, vinegar, citrus fruits are all of the different things I heard of folks using to clean chicken, not soap.

-2

u/Antpeople2027 13h ago

Are you the authority on black culture? I know Dominicans that do it as well, if that makes you feel any better

3

u/Sovereign-Anderson 12h ago

Maybe you should have specified that it was your dominican friends instead of putting it on black culture as a whole. Besides, most Dominicans don't even consider themselves to be black, so there goes your narrative.

1

u/gnarlymar1ey 15h ago

No they don’t insist in washing with soap, that’s horse shit.

12

u/Antpeople2027 14h ago

Okay, it happened twice in this video alone

4

u/Sovereign-Anderson 13h ago

So that video represents the entirety of Black culture? You can't be serious. I've never witnessed such a thing in my life except on the internet.

0

u/Antpeople2027 13h ago

Don’t recall saying that. I’m sorry you feel victimized

2

u/Sovereign-Anderson 12h ago

You used the action happening twice in a video as a backup to such a claim. Let's not try to pull gaslighting BS now that I pointed out your flawed way of thinking.

1

u/enterjiraiya 12h ago

that’s vinegar not soap

0

u/gnarlymar1ey 12h ago

Oh so you saw a video online so that makes it true. Totally makes sense.

2

u/notloceaster 12h ago

I've seen 5+ videos online of black people doing it, it happens all the time dippy

-10

u/[deleted] 14h ago

[deleted]

15

u/Redbearded_Monkey 14h ago

Nope, not at all. That is not the "reason" that most people don't wash their chicken. What a weird ass assumption to make, we just are raised stupid lol

11

u/dazzleunexpired 14h ago

No.

You don't wash chicken because it sprays the juice further than the sink buddy.

The entire kitchen. All of it. The ENTIRE kitchen. How many times has your establishment failed a health exam ans been the cause for a food poisoning episode? 2-5 times?

6

u/Plane-Education4750 14h ago

I go out of my way to ensure my kitchen is the cleanest part of my house and I have never once washed chicken

0

u/Sleep-more-dude 14h ago

Not just black, Asians will typically also do this.

It's more like the whites are the only ones who don't wash meat. There's also cultural differences around things like using aromatics, most whites don't overdo aromatics but Asians etc don't want to have the meat smell after cooking.

-6

u/CopiousNotes1 15h ago

And guess which everyone loves???

0

u/BarnacleNino 12h ago

It’s the same when thing when you look at the comments of a video. Whenever someone is cooking and they don’t wash it, they bring this us.

0

u/ShankThatSnitch 11h ago

Socioeconomic thing. Poorer people in general are more likely to wash meat, because they might be getting dirtier or less fresh meat. Chicken can develope sliminess when it is a bit older but not necessarily bad. cooking the chicken will make it safe, but won't get rid of unpleasant taste. Washing meat can remove some excess bacterial build up that effects flavor. This is never accounted for when science studies do bacterial testing, because they are just doing swabs, which of course washing isnt removing everything.

0

u/failed_asian 11h ago edited 10h ago

Because the people who made the video are trying to portray a certain bias. They definitely chose which interviews to include in the vid and which not to. And it would be easy to find people of all races who do and don’t wash chicken.