Out with the new, in with the old

Q: I’ve seen a lot about foodborne illness and contamination in the media lately. I know I don’t have much control when I’m eating away from my home, but is there anything I can do in my own kitchen to make sure the food I’m preparing for my family is as safe as possible?

Dr. Wright: One of the easiest things you can do to increase food safety in your own kitchen is to switch from plastic to wooden cutting boards. This might surprise you, since plastic cutting boards have become the norm these days, and certainly seem like they’d be the more hygienic choice.

But research shows that wooden cutting boards do not sustain the growth of bacteria. The plastic versions, on the other hand, do. In part, this research was stimulated by various health departments mandating the use of plastic cutting boards in commercial establishments. These mandates were based on the assumption that wood–with all its cracks, crevices, and knife cuts–would harbor microorganisms, and that seamless hard plastic — with only superficial grooving from knives — could be cleaned more easily and effectively.

But researchers found that microorganisms simply didn’t survive on wooden cutting boards that were cleaned after use. And plastic cutting boards, even after similar cleaning, did, in fact, harbor bacteria with regularity.