Cooking For Engineers

bob_shiltz · Joined: 21 Mar 2007 Posts: 6

Over and over, I see warnings against cleaning knives in a dishwasher. It seems that for reasons involving heat, detergent properties, and "banging around", hand-washing only seems to be the method of choice.

What I'm wondering (and what searches here and on google have failed to answer) is how you hand-wash in such a way that you can be certain the knife is sterile.

If I'm cleaving through a chicken one night, I want to be sure there haven't been trace salmonella colonies growing on my blade. I've read that bleach and stainless steel are a bad combination. The only other methods I know of for sterilization are heat, radiation, and ethanol. Handles probably wouldn't take the heat very well, and I don't know of any consumer devices that use UV to sterilize. I haven't found much out about how ethanol interacts with metals.

So how do you sanitize your cutlery? Surely I'm missing something.

GaryProtein · Joined: 26 Oct 2005 Posts: 535

Without an autoclave, it is not possible to sterilize your cooking or eating utensils. No one needs sterilized utensils. Quite frankly, I'd be more worried about picking up a serious pathogen from someone's fork or spoon that they ate with, than from a knife used in preparing the meal. Dirty hands and prep surfaces (like cutting boards and counter tops) are the bigger problem with food preparation. If you wash your utensils with warm to hot soap and water and get all the grease off, you will have done a good job sanitizing your utensils.

By definition, if there is NOTHING on the surface in question (totally, 100% clean) then there are no cultivatable life forms--it is sterile.

Ethanol will not harm stainless steel or plastic utensils used in cooking. I don't know about long term use on aluminum components.

Good soapy water will do the trick.

EngineeringProfessor · Joined: 07 Sep 2006 Posts: 77

Guest · Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 2:36 am Post subject: Re: Hand washing knives

DrBiggles · Joined: 12 May 2005 Posts: 356 Location: Richmond, CA

GaryProtein · Joined: 26 Oct 2005 Posts: 535

SirShazar · Joined: 30 Jul 2007 Posts: 89

I wouldn't be that concerned about sanitizing your knives. The infection potential of a washed knife seems trivial when compared to any kind of organic material.

DrBiggles · Joined: 12 May 2005 Posts: 356 Location: Richmond, CA

Cucina Pro · Joined: 22 Oct 2007 Posts: 22

Here is a short video by Alton Brown (and he is the spokesperson for Shun, after all!) that suggests how to clean knives. I agree with everything he does except putting in on a drainer to dry. ANY knife should be dried and stored immediately after it is washed.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/food/show_ea/text/0,1976,FOOD_9956_50120,00.html

GaryProtein · Joined: 26 Oct 2005 Posts: 535

I would guess that the reason for not drying the knife is because his cleaning method keeps hands away from the blade and there isn't a tool analagous to the brush he used for washing that can be used for drying. I like to dry my knives by holding a towel against the back of the knife and wiping from the handle to the tip (wide to narrow end) of the blade. That way the blade cannot cut into anything. Alternatively, a towel can be placed flat on the counter and the blade dried by wiping one side at a time.

I can't blame Alton Brown for teaching that technique. It has the lowest possibility of injury and legal ramifications. I'll also say, I have had two relatives (my mother-in-law and a cousin) require the use of the emergency room resulting from knife injuries while "helping" in the kitchen. My daughter, then about 5, has a very vivid memory of her grandmother going to the hospital because my in-laws were taking care of her while her mother and I were out of town and she had to go with them to the hospital. Most people are just not used to ten inch scalpels in the house.