To ask if you wash your meat?

[over2021]

No, not another penis beaker!

Today two colleagues in another department were talking about their dinner and it came up that they both wash their meat with a mix of lemon, water and salt before cooking it.

AIBU or is that not the norm? Or have I been feeding my friends and family dirty meat my entire adult life?!

No. My grandmother used to wash mince, but I've never known anyone else to wash meat.

No, I never wash meat. Never!

Never seen nor heard of anyone doing this! Why do it? Cooking would kill any surface bacteria.

Washing meat increases risk of contamination in kitchen

Never. What a pointless waste of time.

Different cultures do different things. I always wash my meat with lemon & water and everyone I know does the same

No I don't.

We always wash our meat and everyone i know washes their meat before cooking.

I don't. People from some other cultures do. Think Caribbean people do, if I'm not mistaken.

It’s a cultural thing.

DH is Jamaican and all the cooks in his family wash meat and fish before cooking.

I thought it was dangerous to wash meat because of the contamination risk.

We used to wash meat in plain water in the UK, I remember my Mum doing this when I was little, then it was discovered that washing spread more bacteria and increased the chance of food poisoning.

The salt and acid in the lemon might be reducing the risk of cross contamination but I don’t know anyone that does this.

You're making me feel better about my dirty meat

You could be spot on re: culture- both are British but with different heritage (not Caribbean though!)

If you wash your meat, what cultural background are you from?

No because it sounds like a recipe for splashing dodgy bacteria about the kitchen preparation area.

Never

No. I try to have as little to do with the meat as possible before it gets cooked.

No I don't but some cultures do

It could cause contamination so definitely not

I was always taught you should wash chicken before cooking, but current food safety advice is not to, any bacteria is killed by cooking but washing your meat will spread raw meat bacteria around your kitchen.

No. Never.
There was a thread about this last month.

It's common in some cultures.

I live in a hot country where it's routine - meat from the market may have been hung on hooks where it could get dusty or attract flies.

I know it's not generally advised for 'spraying bugs all over the kitchen' reasons, but I'm pretty sure I'd be giving everything a good rinse if I was buying meat that had been sold in conditions of dubious hygiene, if only to get the traffic fumes off!

& then it becomes culturally embedded even when it's not necessary or healthy...like when my grandma used to put the Xmas sprouts on to boil hours in advance.

Never and I'm a cook. But l do remember my mum washing chicken in the 70's. No idea why and she's not alive to ask.

Nope

It’s advised not to wash a whole chicken carcass, as it spreads pathogenic bacteria from the cavity all over the bird. Solid meat (such as steak or chops) only has bacteria on the surface, and these will be killed by the cooking method, such as hot fat or high oven temp.
Mince has bacteria distributed all through it, and needs thoroughly cooked until there is no pinkness left. Washing it would be difficult and unlikely to be effective.