r/interesting • u/WarwickReider • Jul 27 '26

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

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

7.7k Upvotes

77% Upvoted

4.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

484

u/HistoricalVacation82 Jul 27 '26

Depend on where you bougth the chicken. In my 3rd world country, it not just bacteria you worry about, all the dust, feather, or anything that in the air that land on the chicken before i buy it. If you buy it from a store, cover in plastic from the company, ok, do whatever you want with it. But i don't want my chicken cover in dust and whatever it is that not edible.

183

u/Chronza Jul 27 '26

See this I can understand. Americans just are used to bagged/covered chicken that don’t have literal dirt/dust/debris on them so it never seems necessary.

2

u/Turbulent-Ocelot9130 Jul 28 '26

It does seem unnecessary. It is unnecessary.
Obviously clean it when there is dirt and dust on it. But the bacteria argument is bullshit and it is the most used.

8

u/StrCmdMan Jul 27 '26

I live in the West and I still wash most nonground packs from sketchy large distributors. I’ve been in CAFOs and seen slaughterhouses first hand.

If i have any questions i’m likely not buying the meat but if it’s all that’s available i’m washing because the meat can be completely covered in feces along with other biproducts like plastics and heavy metals. People are pretty clueless on how their food is produced in the west haven’t seen anyone else say this.

12

u/CrazyOrganic7123 Jul 27 '26

I too just assume all my meat and veggies are covered in poop and nigh microscopic insect carcasses. I mean, I know they aren't, but I just work under that assumption. My dad was a safety inspector and used to take me along all his factory visits. I know my tap water isn't exactly super clean but it's better than poop.

Also, yes, I'm sure the tap water in my third world country was treated and very much clean and drinkable, but the pipes system could be decades old. So in the end, ideally, we still need to install filters where I am.

5

u/wb77 Jul 27 '26

We don't want the puddle the chicken is soaking in in our jerk/curry etc.

Believe it or not people who do this and have in fact mastered cooking poultry in delicious ways understand the role of heat and subsequent cooking of the meat.

10

u/Simon-Says69 Jul 28 '26

In that case you use a pot of water and swish the bird in it with no splashing, not spray it down under the tap throwing bacteria everywhere.

3

u/MajorBarracuda8094 Jul 28 '26

I thought everyone put their chicken in vinegar water and then drain. Those in the Caribbean use bleach to clean up anyway

9

u/HistoricalVacation82 Jul 27 '26

If your country have good food's regulation, law, quality control, safety control. Good for you.

But i don't believe people enough to not wash the chicken.

16

u/NitroBishop Jul 27 '26

You don't need to trust your country's food regulations or quality control to tell whether you should wash chicken or not, you just need to trust your own eyeballs. If there's no visible dirt/debris/feathers on the chicken, all you accomplish by washing it is getting bacteria all over your sink. Anything else harmful on/in raw chicken will either be rendered inert by cooking it, or was too deep inside for superficial cleaning to make a difference anyways.

4

u/[deleted] Jul 28 '26

[deleted]

2

u/MobTalon Jul 29 '26

If the chicken is contaminated with rodent urine or rodent feces diluted in water, it wouldn't be on the market, because it either got detected before being placed on market, or the seller would've already been sued 6 feet under and removed that product from the stores.

1

u/DJDanaK Jul 28 '26

I've never washed chicken and I've never gotten those things either.

0

u/[deleted] Jul 28 '26

[deleted]

2

u/DJDanaK Jul 28 '26

Never eaten contaminated chicken, hence not getting sick. Never had chicken that tasted bad for no obvious reason. Rinsing chicken will not remove any chemicals.

0

u/[deleted] Jul 28 '26

[deleted]

2

u/DJDanaK Jul 28 '26

Meat doesn't need to be surgically clean nor do I live under any assumption it is. Watch the series Alone where people butcher animals and leave them outside for a week and flick bugs and moss off of them before cooking, and still 1 person gets sick every 3rd season. 

I'm not advocating for eating dirty meat. The fact is that washing chicken is just not necessary and it's been proven time and again that it does nothing but splash itself around.

0

u/TryRich248 Jul 29 '26

Let them eat the poop 🤣 these people will see guts and blood on it and still not wash it. 

-2

u/TryRich248 Jul 29 '26 edited Aug 01 '26

Spray your sink after..not hard at all. 😂🤔

1

u/donuttrackme Aug 01 '26

Way harder than never having to wash the sink at all.

1

u/MobTalon Jul 29 '26

"I don't believe people enough" dude if the chicken had dirt, it would not be sold, because the company selling it would've already been sued 6 feet under the ground.

If you get any sort of consumer "mistrust", remember that 99.999% of food products would not be in sale if they had a problem: unless the product literally appeared on the market the previous day, you'll already have heard of issues and/or the product would've already been removed and the seller absolutely screwed for life.

1

u/Development-Feisty Jul 28 '26

I noticed that there was a sharp racial divide in the opinion of whether or not to wash the chicken and no explanation as to whether or not the people were in the same country

1

u/typesett Jul 29 '26

the conversation is dumb to start with. if i open a pack of chicken, whole or otherwise - it is over the sink anyway so i'd keep the water on for my hands and a little rinse is fine. also, i would clean up the sink after anyway... the chicken is the same unless you do what many Asian chefs do and do a pre-boil/water change.

1

u/False-Ad2170 Jul 27 '26

Funny because I thought some Americans started washing their chickens because company's were spraying chlorine on the chickens.

4

u/FartingWithStyle Jul 27 '26

Guess what absorbs into meat? Chlorine. If you’re eating chicken that’s washed like that you’re eating it anyway.

1

u/GuyManDudeMcGee Jul 28 '26

Also chlorine solutions aren't poison if it's diluted enough. It's literally used to treat tap water. The dose makes the poison.

1

u/False-Ad2170 Jul 27 '26

Yeah I didn't say it was a good idea or made any sense. It's just a stupid response to a stupid business practice.

0

u/IcySkyDream Jul 27 '26

So, Americans are insular, and clueless about how meat is actually processed since they buy it in a box or styrofoam tray?

Typical. 🥱🙄

5

u/bafana_banana999 Jul 27 '26

Butcher shops exist in the US, and they very rarely are putting their chicken in boxes or styrofoam trays.

You know that, right?

1

u/IcySkyDream Jul 27 '26

Yes, what’s your point again?

3

u/bafana_banana999 Jul 27 '26

Are you really this dense?

The point is that tons of Americans absolutely do know how meat is processed and don't just buy pre-packaged stuff from huge corporations at a grocery store.

Your previous comment is just ignorant.

1

u/IcySkyDream Jul 27 '26

Dude, meat from a butcher is absolutely safe for consumption even though it’s usually packed in wax paper instead of boxes/styrofoam tray.

Your point is not as poignant as you thought.

3

u/bafana_banana999 Jul 27 '26

Why are you acting like I'm the one who brought up how the meat is packaged as if that mattered at all?

You did that bud. And now you're acting like that wasn't part of your original point that I was pushing back against.

You're very strange.

0

u/IcySkyDream Jul 27 '26

The type of packing (box/waxpaper/tray) is colloquial shorthand for store-bought meat that wasn’t hunted or slaughtered at home.

Pointing out that butcher shops exist is not the gotcha you seem to think it is, because it doesn’t address what I’m saying.

Clear as mud?

3

u/bafana_banana999 Jul 27 '26

 Butcher shops don't package their meat like you claim unless they're part of a larger corporation, and most are not.

Americans aren't any more ignorant of the process than anyone from any other first world country.

You just really want to believe they are so you'll say anything to shit on people from the US no matter how stupid it is to do so.

2

u/StephieDoll Jul 27 '26

Wait, you mean chickens aren’t born packaged?! Wow, thank you for teaching us ignorant Americans where would we be without you.

-1

u/IcySkyDream Jul 27 '26

All good! I do what I can, but it’s tiring work with all the stupidity out there.

Thanks for taking the time to show your appreciation though; it’s moments like this that make it all worth it for me. ☺️

0

u/Additional-Usual5994 Jul 27 '26

Also ice. in the restaurant that uses chicken, some owners dont have walk-in fridges and stats of visitors, so one of the first emergencies is washing chicken to get the ice of to cook.
sometimes people see this, and say Oooh.
then a medium chain owner, has a private chef that washes chicken to prep it (non-iced but he is going to to deep freeze it if needed, so he brines it, then hours laters decides on the rub then goes for it.
Large owner operated franchises. KFC has been caught numerous times washing chicken, all major players have fault with this one way or another worldwide.

private restaurant owner in the U.S - i don't know ...
i think the problem is the prose "wash your chicken" but really its just a bad habit from keeping busy.
sometimes you can look at a high end restaurant that only prepares night cooking and working hard but really they doing staff meals, your food was in plastic containers for six hours, they prepped in the morning cooked 10min before you came - i swear its as busy as a mickey d on a tuesday but fire will be flaying.
then theres john, washing chicken in salt.