Food Fell On The Floor

New york sep 11 ians food once dropped on the floor is not safe to eat however quickly you pick it up warns a new study that debunks the widely accepted notion that it is all right to scoop up food and eat it within a safe five second window.

Food fell on the floor.

It is generally safe to eat all food that has been dropped on a residential floor that is mopped or vacuumed once a week no matter the timing. You can decide if you want to eat the dirty food or not but you shouldn t tell yourself that it s somehow safe if it didn t spend 5 seconds on the floor. Rumtscho sep 3 14 at 9 52. Whatever the food picks up it picks it up the moment it touches the floor.

When you drop a piece of food on the floor any bacteria living on the floor will adhere to it. It doesn t matter if you pick it up at once after 5 seconds or after 5 minutes. There s a big difference between picking up a cracker from a just cleaned dry kitchen floor probably safe versus the floor near the cat litter box not. Wondering if food is still ok to eat after it s been dropped on the floor or anywhere else is a pretty common experience.

Or between a reasonably clean living room carpet probably. It depends on just how much bacteria can make it from floor to food in a few seconds and just how dirty the floor is. And it s probably not a new one either. In some instances the transfer begins in less than one second.

As someone who loves food hates wasting things and is sometimes messy this is an important question. Moisture type of surface and contact time all contribute to cross contamination. But it depends on what you drop and where. A few days ago some friends and i discussed whether we would eat food if it fell on the floor.

So here comes the good news germophobes. Occasionally eating food that was briefly on the floor is not likely to make you sick.