OT: 5 second food on the ground rule?

[ClifSpliffy]

seen at a cookout recently. guy walks up to the grill, grabs one of those gigunda hotdogs, mishandles it, and it falls to the deck. without missing a beat, he picks it up, two fingers delicately, does a shaking move for a second or two, and says, to no one in particular, '5 second rule,' and walks off, dog on bun in hand.
among us bystanders, an animated discussion breaks out on this, news to me, topic. is this a rule, and if so, what are the parameters for it? is there a treatise about it?

 

[RockyMTblue2]

Dude's biggest problem is what is in the hot dog, not what it picked up in the fall. But if any food hits the dirt - hits the deck in mother nature - you are playing Russian roulette. Inside an IRT bathroom - same. But it turns out that it has some science behind it in clean indoor environments. 5 Second Rule For Food

 

[ClifSpliffy]

Dude's biggest problem is what is in the hot dog, not what it picked up in the fall. But if any food hits the dirt - hits the deck in mother nature - you are playing Russian roulette. Inside an IRT bathroom - same. But it turns out that it has some science behind it in clean indoor environments. 5 Second Rule For Food

View attachment 44798

whoaaa, an actual web md treatise? how cool is that. thanks.

 

[willtalk]

It probably depends of a few things. The condition of the ground it falls on. How hungry you are in contrast to how much food is available. What type of food hits the ground- is it cleanable or if need be can you separate the part that hit the ground from the part that didn't. Some types of food are totally out such as soup etc. lol.

 

[temery]

Gut biome is the new biggest thing. Our food is too sterile. The only thing I won't eat off the floor, is soup.

 

[Sifaka]

Don't forget this oft overlooked section of the Five Second Rule:

The dropper of ugly orange victuals, cf. TennVol Orange, has the option under Civil Code
§ 1782 to offer a correction to affected diners. But
¶ 17 of the agreement suggests an airline style regurgitation sack is required.

WARNING! do Not try eating this at home. "CDC estimates that each year roughly 1 in 6 Americans (or 48 million people) gets sick, 128,000 are hospitalized, and 3,000 die of foodborne diseases." Source: Burden of Foodborne Illness: Findings | Estimates of Foodborne Illness | CDC

 

[nwhoopfan]

If you drop food somewhere in the back country, whatever dirt and other stuff gets on it is trail spice.

 

[itsasport]

When my son was young, I heard him brag to a friend that his dad had picked up food off the ground and eaten it

The five second rule be damned!

 

[vtcwbuff]

Depends - hard floor/my kitchen/my food the 5 second rule might be invoked - unless there's lots more. Anywhere else probably not (I won't even eat a french fry dropped off my plate onto a restaurant table) - except camping. I've often scraped dirt and ashes off campfire food.

The bottom line "Until further studies are done, there's no consensus on how safe it is to eat dropped food. "

 

[bluedevil]

I had a girlfriend who called me 5 second man..don"t think it was a complement though........

 

[meyers7]

It probably depends of a few things. The condition of the ground it falls on. How hungry you are in contrast to how much food is available. What type of food hits the ground- is it cleanable or if need be can you separate the part that hit the ground from the part that didn't. Some types of food are totally out such as soup etc. lol.

i.e. how much you like the food.

 

[BIGMAC]

A word of caution for people who have pets in the house, be careful that the food item does not pick up a speck of fecal matter.

 

[ClifSpliffy]

upon further review and introspection...on a camel safari in the libyan desert, led by beduins.(don't kid urself, a week on that sneezing, snorting, saliva spewing yugo, all the while plodding thru a place that seems a lot like area 51, to reach some supposed 'mystical' oasis that's about as big as a bathtub, suxxx beyond sucking. im an idiot--don't even romanticize it. dumb. way better to have spent the time at lake quassy.). getting used to their seemingly every 5 minutes stop, to drink shot glasses of tea filled with about 10 lbs of sugar, along with their smoking about a carton of butts, we brake for the first meal. gather some driftwood, check that, twigs, and anything else that might burn, and making the star (bread) of the meal begins. a paste (dough?) of flour, water, and salt (and sand,lol) is hucked onto the groundfires' ashes, turned once, and then distributed to the crowd, for each to brush off the attached crud. lovely. so I guess I've eaten plenty from 'off the ground,' along with smoking my first cigarette, and altogether, an exercise from the anthony bourdain cookbook 'Tastes Like .' oh, and camels have only one speed--the 'd' on the tranny stands for 'don't care,' and the 'p' stands for 'phuggetchuu.'

 

[DefenseBB]

A word of caution for people who have pets in the house, be careful that the food item does not pick up a speck of fecal matter.

That is a crappy thing to tell us...

 

[vtcwbuff]

A word of caution for people who have pets in the house, be careful that the food item does not pick up a speck of fecal matter.

Or kids in the house, or old folks in the house.

It does amuse me how germaphobic we have become. Hiking in the Green Mountain National Forest last year with friends. We came upon a spring and I dropped down for a drink of refreshing cold water. They were freaked because I drank untreated water "it could have germs!!!"and "haven't you heard of giardia?" I could have explained that I was drinking spring water straight from the depths of the earth, or that giardia is very rare but it was more fun having them watch me to see if I was going to get sick.

Part of it is the all news/all social media 24/7 thing I suppose.

 

[cabbie191]

In prep for a display that my office had at a public event on medication take back opportunities, I put together a short public health quiz. This included the five second rule. An absolute no no.

Here’s another one: in a public restroom, is it more hygienic to dry your hands with a blow dryer or a paper towel?

I’ll answer later so I don’t have a spoiler alert situation.

 

[Bigboote]

whoaaa, an actual web md treatise? how cool is that. thanks.

It was an actual published study, and not the only one.

Another tidbit: The most germ-infested part of most kitchens is the counter tops. And the cleaner the kitchen looks, generally the more germ-infested it is. This is because most people clean their counters with sponges, which are usually totally infested. I use dish rags, which are frequently laundered, and I use them not all that frequently.

 

[Bigboote]

Here’s another one: in a public restroom, is it more hygienic to dry your hands with a blow dryer or a paper towel?

I dry them on my pants. They may be full of germs, but they're MY germs.

 

[ClifSpliffy]

people's state forest. Connecticut. got a pack of a dozen or so farnum kids for our annual camp out. me and some yale girls are the adults, with a guest adult girl who is some kind of environmental whatever from kali. trudging our junk up to the site, I see the ubiquitous ct state park pitcher pump, and say 'there's our water, get the jugs.' just as we start pumping, kaligurl is coming around the bend, drops her junk, and comes running at us yelling 'stop!stop!' mmmkay, now what? she proceeds to lecture us about groundwater pollution in connecticut. kids all turn and look at me quizzically. I tell pumpkid to continue, and stick my head in the water, mouth wide open, guzzling away. then, pretty much every kid stuck their mug in there to get some of that good stuff. it was a hot day.
(on a subsequent trip to silver sands, and after I just finished a lecture with lab on 'how to skip rocks into the surf' ms late-arriving buzzkill kaliperson starts yelling at them to stop immediately, cuz 'something, something, leave it as you found it, and don't dare bring home a seashell.' ever the naturalist, I pick up a softball sized rock, throw it in the direction of the causeway, and say something about building a better causeway. pretty funny to watch 15 kids pick up anything they could find, and thro it in the ocean. one of the future lawyer kids says to ms braindamage 'ur lucky he didn't toss u in...')

 

[reno tony]

I had a dog that did not allow any five second rule opportunities. And I don't remember her getting sick from eating my food escapees off the floor or ground.

 

[Husky25]

Rod Beck lost the gum from his mouth on the Rogers' Centre mound. In one motion following the pitch and on the way to the dugout, he quickly bent down, picked it up and tossed it back into his mouth.

He died 6 years later. Jessayin'.

The truth is if a piece of food hits the floor, thousands of germs and bacteria transfer immediately. OTOH, it doesn't necessarily mean the piece of food is dangerous. The hydrochloric acid in your stomach tends to help kill most that could harm you.

My own feelings depend on the situation. Liquid and liquid based food is lost. If a chip or something similar were to fall on my own pool deck, back porch or hard wood floor, I probably wouldn't think twice about eating it. I would probably put the hot dog back on the grill for a couple a few, noting which one it was and eat it myself. If I were at someone else's house or in the presence of company, I'd toss it.

 

[CL82]

Gut biome is the new biggest thing. Our food is too sterile. The only thing I won't eat off the floor, is soup.

Pudding?

 

[CL82]

It was an actual published study, and not the only one.

Another tidbit: The most germ-infested part of most kitchens is the counter tops. And the cleaner the kitchen looks, generally the more germ-infested it is. This is because most people clean their counters with sponges, which are usually totally infested. I use dish rags, which are frequently laundered, and I use them not all that frequently.

I use paper towels for wipe downs. Spritz a cleaner on it is raw meat, etc.

 

[CL82]

In prep for a display that my office had at a public event on medication take back opportunities, I put together a short public health quiz. This included the five second rule. An absolute no no.

Here’s another one: in a public restroom, is it more hygienic to dry your hands with a blow dryer or a paper towel?

I’ll answer later so I don’t have a spoiler alert situation.

Astoundingly it is a paper towel. Of course that presumes the dozens of people who grabbed on before you haven't culture the containers.

I should put this the pet peeve thread but have you ever noticed bathroom that have one of those high speed blowers directly above a trash can? It's like some genius went, "uh we always put the trash under the paper towel dispensers. It's the same thing right?"

 

[Bezzz]

Hand blow dryers spray your hands with fecal matter. Lovely. Paper towels are moderately more safe, but zh!t is everywhere in a public toilet. Hold it in, assuming your prostate likes you.