Happy Birthday, MFauli!

[Animeniax]

Who drains their cooked rice? You mean while washing off the grains before cooking? Even then using a colander is just a waste of time and another thing to clean.

Happy bday again, MFauli. Is that your real first initial and last name?

[MFauli]

1.) you don´t wash rice. Have some faith in the hygiene of your supplier :>
2.) It´s calendar in English.

Happy bday again, MFauli. Is that your real first initial and last name?

Initial of my first name, but no, "Fauli" is not my last name, lol.

[Animeniax]

Most rice suppliers are third world Asians who could care less about cleanliness or proper procedure for handling food.

[Kraco]

Unless rice is parboiled, the washing before cooking is done to remove excess starch dust from the rice, to prevent it from turning too sticky. White rice is polished, after all. When you wash it, you can easily see the washing water turn slightly white due to the dust.

Well, I rinse even parboiled rice. Who knows what might have ended up in the product during the long production chain.

[Animeniax]

Nah we love sticky rice where I come from (SE Asia). We wash it to fool ourselves that it is cleaned of all the funk that might have gotten on the rice during production and transport as you said. In the same vein we still get bottled water by the gallon instead of drinking tap water.

Initial of my first name, but no, "Fauli" is not my last name, lol.

If it were you wouldn't be the first internet user to do something that dumb. My dad had his SSN as the username for his online bank account before I made him change it.

[Kraco]

Nah we love sticky rice where I come from (SE Asia).

It's plenty sticky even after washing. Only parboiled rice isn't sticky. Or rice that hasn't been polished at all and that would take you ten hours to chew, but the fiber content would be phenomenal.

[Abdula]

I mean, I know what a colander IS, I just don't get how you go from spelling calendar -> calender -> colander lol

Well then allow me to introduce you to one of my favorite sites on this here internetz. Dumbest tweets. Ever. Peruse at your own risk.

If it were you wouldn't be the first internet user to do something that dumb. My dad had his SSN as the username for his online bank account before I made him change it.

I can top that. Someone who I dubiously call a friend has his address in his gamertag.

[Buffalobiian]

Nah we love sticky rice where I come from (SE Asia). We wash it to fool ourselves that it is cleaned of all the funk that might have gotten on the rice during production and transport as you said. In the same vein we still get bottled water by the gallon instead of drinking tap water.

Ever gone to Hong Kong? It's common practice there to wash your utensils with hot water or tea at the table of restaurants before eating. It might do something, but it's not the antiseptic technique the locals believe it to be. Tap water quality varies, so I can see why people can develop a habit from living in less fortunate areas.

[Animeniax]

Ever gone to Hong Kong? It's common practice there to wash your utensils with hot water or tea at the table of restaurants before eating. It might do something, but it's not the antiseptic technique the locals believe it to be. Tap water quality varies, so I can see why people can develop a habit from living in less fortunate areas.

Yep I've been there. I can't recall if I did it there but I pretty much always clean utensils before using them, even here in the US. My parents use the lime wedges served at every table to clean with, as the acidic juices are thought to kill bacteria.

[shinta|hikari]

Doesn't hot water kill bacteria though?

[Buffalobiian]

Doesn't hot water kill bacteria though?

It's a function of heat and time. I can't tell you the details for the common bacteria, some are harder to kill than others.

My issue is that there's no real standardisation or knowledge behind the action. Water temp and rinsing time isn't controlled. USA's EPA recommends boiling water for 1 minute, for example to make water safe to drink. The way people commonly rinse their stuff at restaurants neither uses boiling water nor reaches 1 minute. That's why restaurants are supposed to sanitise their utensils after rinsing, because bacteria still remains. Many don't though.

Users are lulled into a false sense of security because they're using the hot water as if it's an alcohol wash. Bringing your own alcohol wipes would be the way to go if you were so worried.

Even then they probably wouldn't know how to use it, because to killing of bacteria with alcohol happens as the alcohol dries. That means that you should wait 30secs to 2minutes after wiping for the actual killing action to complete.

[Kraco]

I'd imagine most restaurants in industrialised countries would wash their utensils in a dishwasher. Due to less mechanical cleaning action compared to hand washing, the detergent is real poison and highly alkaline. So alkaline that in time it will turn even drinking glasses opaque.

If the restaurant is sporting bacteria that will survive such conditions, I imagine you would notice when entering the place. The employees would probably try to eat your brain immediately.

[shinta|hikari]

I'd imagine most restaurants in industrialised countries

That is the assumption that excludes so many other cases.

[Buffalobiian]

I'd imagine most restaurants in industrialised countries would wash their utensils in a dishwasher.

I know of 6 restaurant back-areas either due to friend or personal employment experience in Australia. Only 2 of those used dishwashers. The rest just free-styled. None currently use any form of sanitiser.

It's a small sample so it doesn't extrapolate to much though.

[shinta|hikari]

Machine dishwashers also take a lot of time. Human ones can do it far faster and on demand (unlike machines that do it in batches), but have obviously none of the disinfection the machine provides. Most dish detergents have anti bacterial properties though, assuming the ads are true.

[Ryllharu]

Most commercial dishwashers sterilize using very hot water. There is no way a human is faster. The cycle is barely over a minute long, and that's for the entire rack of dishes.

I'm not sure most of them even use any kind of detergent.

[shinta|hikari]

I have only ever used household dishwashers, which take about 30 minutes to wash, steam, and dry the dishes. If commercial ones really do clean as fast as you say, then I stand corrected.

[Kraco]

Most commercial dishwashers sterilize using very hot water. There is no way a human is faster. The cycle is barely over a minute long, and that's for the entire rack of dishes.

I'm not sure most of them even use any kind of detergent.

Hmm... Does some physical phenomenon allow hot water to remove fat without detergent?

But like you said, they are fast indeed, from what I've seen. I merely assumed they must use some nasty detergent as well.

However, I admit I have no basis whatsoever to assume smaller food establishments would use proper methods and/or machines. Since you guys seem to have personal experience indicating the contrary, I'll yield.

[Buffalobiian]

I've had to use a commercial one before, and I don't think Ryll emphasises very enough. It's more like VERY hot. The dishes were simply too hot to comfortably remove from the rack. I respect its washing prowess though. We only used it for rinsing however, the dishes were still scrubbed with detergent prior to being put on the racks.

At the other end, I washed after 100+ people singlehandedly by hand one time after waiting on them (waiting was shared between 3-4 other staff) which was kinda fun and interesting (since I only had to do it once and get to brag about it). Not much sterilisation going on there. All this aside though, I've never seen any of the establishments I've known get fined/shut for food safety. That either spells badly for the inspection system or it shows that the official standards are needlessly high.

[Animeniax]

I can't see that a dishwasher can get the scrubbing action of washing by hand with a rough sponge.

Doesn't hot water kill bacteria though?

Boiling water kills bacteria, but no one would hand-wash with water that hot. I don't even know that a dishwasher can use water that hot (it pulls hot water from the tap, same as your sink, with no reservoir to boil the water (it's not like a coffee maker).

edit: this is from HowStuffWorks:

Although dishwashers are watertight, they don't actually fill with water. Just a small basin at the bottom fills up. There, heating elements heat the water to 130 to 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

So definitely not hot enough to kill all bacteria.