Saturday, February 02, 2008

Double Dipping

What do you do at 1:30 a.m. when you're up with your sick 3 year old? You blog while you hope the cool bath brings her fever down.

I'll be attending a Super Bowl party on Sunday with some friends of mine. Now thanks to this article, this is all I'll be thinking about.

On Sunday, millions of Americans will be plopped in front of big-screen TVs watching the Super Bowl — and, yes — stuffing their faces with chips, dip and anything else they can get their hands on.

So, this brings up the question: Is double dipping really that bad?

A new study by Clemson University set out to answer that exact question.

According to The New York Times, the study was inspired by an episode of "Seinfeld" in which the character George Costanza is confronted at a funeral reception after dipping the same chip twice.

Clemson University food microbiologist Paul Dawson said he proposed the study to get undergraduate students involved in scientific research. A team of nine students had volunteers bite a wheat cracker and dip the cracker for three seconds into a tablespoon of dip, it was reported.

They repeated the process with new crackers, for a total of either three or six double dips per dip sample. The team then analyzed the remaining dip and counted the number of aerobic bacteria in it. The students found that on average, three to six double dips transferred about 10,000 bacteria from the eater’s mouth to the remaining dip, the Times reported.

"The way I would put it is, before you have some dip at a party, look around and ask yourself, 'would I be willing to kiss everyone here?' Because you don’t know who might be double-dipping, and those who do are sharing their saliva with you," Dawson told the Times.

The study is set to be published later this year in the Journal of Food Safety.

4 comments:

  1. I often think about the times when using a public restroom and I wash my hands and immediately after washimg my hands, I touch a door handle that has probably been touched by many others that haven't. They should put a sink outside the restromm so you don't have to touch the handle after you washed your hands. Makes more sense to me!

    ReplyDelete
  2. one more thing , I am going in a new direction with my blog, so I have put up my first post. I feel like personal thoughts will be easier for me to maintain my blog everyday. tell monica too please! Nick Beam

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous10:29 AM

    Interesting how this all ties in with Seinfeld...NOT FRIENDS!

    muaaahh!! muaahh!!

    ReplyDelete
  4. But if I'm ok with kissing everyone in the room I can go ahead and just enjoy Iris's Guacamole right?

    ReplyDelete