Don't Wash Your Raw Chicken, Folks

Apparently, Julia Childs was wrong. For those who prepare and cook chicken on regular basis: this is a noteworthy read.


And no, the title of this thread is not a euphemism...unless you want it to be!

or feed unwashed chicken to trolls

"We also hear more about salmonella today then we did in Julia's day, probably because Julia washed her chicken and people today don't."

I don't remember the last time I heard about a salmonella outbreak (and subsequent recall) that had anything to do with chicken. Most of what we hear about today concerns vegetables (especially leafy greens like spinach) that were contaminated at some point during the farming and packaging process. Washing, or not washing, your chicken would have nothing to do with that.

In addition, no disrespect to the late Julia Childs, but that quick rinse she gave her chicken is not going to really change anything in regards to removing any bacteria. What it will do is splash now germ-infected water that a lot of people won't think of wiping up right away, if at all.

Want to avoid salmonella? Follow basic kitchen safety to avoid cross-contamination and make sure you cook your food to the recommended temperature. Doing those will keep you far less likely from getting sick than just rinsing your chicken under the faucet for a few seconds.

That's because you don't hear the truth in the lamestream media.

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The NPR story is correct. Washing a chicken is not good for exactly the reasons stated.

If you watch Julia's show, you can regularly see her butcher a chicken and then use the same knife/cutting board to chop her veggies without so much as wiping the board/knife in between. It was a different time, with different rules.

Julia made amazing contributions to the American kitchen by pulling us out of the 1950s everything-instant-frozen-convenience way of life back into actual cooking from scratch again. But she was certainly no final authority on food safety.

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If I recall correctly, Julia and Jacques had a huge fight about this on their short-lived joint show.

Julia washed the chicken and laughed to herself uproariously as she tickled the chicken under its wings and said "Kootchi-kootchi-chicky-poo!" Meanwhile, Jacques muttered under his breath, "Stoopid Americain, go ahead and catch ze sal-mone-in-the-dell and see if I care eef you die, Amazon-beetch!"

http://www.hulu.com/watch/233291

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Updated On: 8/23/13 at 02:56 PM

PJ, incredible memory you have.

Goth, I'm sure when you get sick from salmonella you'll still think this is "useless information." Cool.

He's not that much younger than you.

Teasing aside, Goth, the problem is that salmonella is far more dangerous than microscopic grit or dirt. I'm happy you've been lucky so far.

The other thing this underlines for me is how important it is to know as far as possible where your food comes from and how it's been processed.

Updated On: 8/23/13 at 03:47 PM

That's kind of my point. There wasn't the chance for contamination as there is now with chicken factories.

Sometimes when the chicken head was chopped off, the body would run around the yard. Talk about freaky. We didn't need horror movies, we had real life.

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Now, who's hungry?!

I can't have chicken tonight. Thanks a lot, Jane! :-P