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We have lots of food myths to
debunk, so let's get right down to business. Although I
will present them in no particular order, I will number
them because we might want to refer back to them. Also,
it makes it look more like I actually planned all this
stuff out in advance.
Food
Myth #1 - Some foods contain "negative" calories
Food Myth #2
- Searing meat seals in the juices
Food Myth #3
- "Caramelized" is just another word for "browned"
Food Myth #4
- A potato will absorb excess salt in a soup or stew
Food Myth #5
- Potato salad will kill you if it isn't refrigerated
constantly
Food Myth #6
- Fruit juices are an essential part of a healthy diet
Food Myth #7
- A calorie is a calorie is a calorie...
Food Myth #8 - You shouldn't
wash mushrooms because they'll soak up water like
little sponges
Food Myth #9 - You
absolutely, positively must drink at least eight
glasses of water every day
Food Myth #10 - Salting meat before
cooking will make it dry and tough
Food Myth #11 - All the alcohol will burn
off when it is cooked
Food Myth
#12 - Adding
salt to a pot of beans will make the beans tough
Food Myth #13
- Adding salt to water will make it boil faster
Food Myth #14
- Leaving an avocado pit in a bowl of guacamole will
prevent the guacamole from turning brown
Food Myth #15
- Pork must be cooked until it's well-done
Food Myth #16
- Boiling vegetables destroys all the nutrients
Food Myth #17
- Adding oil to pasta water will keep the pasta from
sticking together
Food Myth #18
- You shouldn't store bananas in the refrigerator
Food Myth #19
- Foods cooked in aluminum cookware will rot your brain
Food Myth #20
- Throw a strand of spaghetti against the wall and, if
it sticks, it's done
Food Myth #21
- Butter will spoil if not refrigerated constantly
Food Myth #22
- Fresh foods are healthier than processed foods
Food Myth #23
- Baking powder and baking soda will last indefinitely
Food Myth #24 - Pasta should
be rinsed after it is cooked
Food
Myth #1 - Some foods contain "negative" calories
It's possible that some foods
require more energy (in the form of calories burned by
the body) to digest than they provide. At only about 6
calories per rib, celery might be one of these. Sawdust
would be another. Since our bodies are incapable of
digesting the cellulose that makes up much of the bulk
of celery (and sawdust), it passes through our bodies
without contributing anything in the way of calories. It
also provides nothing in the way of nutrition, so from a
nutritional standpoint, eating nothing but celery is
tantamount to starvation. If you really want to go on a
negative calorie diet, let me suggest eating nothing at
all for a couple of months. The pounds will literally
drop away, as will your hair, teeth, and fingernails. If
you get really, really hungry, it's okay to eat as much
sawdust as you want, but that will have no effect on the
rate at which you will die from starvation.
 Food Myth
#2
- Searing meat seals in the juices
Boy, I wish I knew who the
dunderhead was who originally dreamed up this one.
Actually, I do know. It was a German chemist by the name
of Justus von Liebig, and he published the notion
sometime around 1850. Although his theory was based on
presumably sound principles of food chemistry, it was
disproved just a few decades later, yet it continues to
be preached by television cooking show hosts who really
should know better. Anyone can repeat the experiment:
simply take two similar pieces of meat, weigh them, sear
one and don't sear the other, cook them both to the same
internal temperature, then weigh them again. Time after
time, the results indicate that the seared meat loses at
least as much weight due to liquid loss as the un-seared
piece. In fact, searing the meat actually causes a
greater loss of liquid due to the higher temperatures
used. However, there is no arguing that searing meat
creates a lot of flavor, and that is why we do it. The
next time you hear someone state authoritatively that
searing meat locks in the juices, just smile and treat
them like you would a small, ignorant child. The same
thing goes for people who use "browned" and
"caramelized" interchangeably...
Food Myth
#3
- "Caramelized" is just another word for "browned"
There is only one thing that
chafes my hiney more than some pretentious pundit using
big words when they aren't necessary, and that's some
pretentious pundit using big words when they aren't
necessary and using them incorrectly. For the record,
"caramelization" refers to the chemical reactions that
occur when any sugar is heated to the point that its
molecules begin to break apart. Stated differently,
sugar is the only thing that can be caramelized.
All the other browning that goes
on in the kitchen involves a complicated set of chemical
reactions collectively known as the Maillard reactions.
These involve so many different molecules that food
scientists are still trying to figure all of them out,
and one of these reactions involves the caramelization
of sugars. But using the terms "caramelized" and
"browned" interchangeably is a little like referring to
an automobile as a spark plug. Yeah, spark plugs are
part of the equation, but only a small part and only one
among thousands of other components.
So, when some know-it-all TV
cooking show host talks about caramelizing onions, he
really should be talking about browning onions. I'll
grant you that onions contain sugars (as does nearly
everything we eat), and that the caramelization of these
sugars is one of the factors that contributes to the
change in color and flavor that we all like so much, but
caramelization is just one of literally thousands of
reactions involving all sorts of compounds including
proteins, carbohydrates, lipids, amino acids, and not
only sugars.
When you burn the sugar on top
of crème brulée, you are caramelizing it. When you cook
anything else until it is golden brown and delicious, it
is properly known as browning and not caramelizing. I
recommend you use the term "caramelized" only when
referring to sugar or when you want to impress
television network executives with your ability to use
fancy grown-up words.
Food Myth
#4
- A potato will absorb excess salt in a soup or stew
I thought I put this food myth
to rest in my award-winning* essay "All About Salt," but
it keeps rearing its ugly head, so let's take another
crack at it.
When you boil a potato in any
liquid that contains salt, the potato will absorb some
of the salty liquid, but it hasn't actually made the
remaining liquid any less salty. Think of it this way:
if you drop a dry sponge into the liquid, it will also
absorb some of the salty fluid, but the liquid left
behind is no less salty than it was before. Do potatoes
possess some magical properties that sponges don't? The
answer is no. This is just another piece of folk wisdom
that doesn't stand up to critical scrutiny, and we'll
take a look at more such food myths next week. Until
then, have a great myth-free weekend.
* It hasn't actually won any
awards, but I think it should have. Judge for yourself
here.
 Food Myth
#5
- Potato salad will kill you if it isn't refrigerated
constantly
I may have stated this myth a
bit strongly, but many people believe that the
mayonnaise used in such potluck favorites such as potato
salad, egg salad, chicken salad, and deviled eggs will
become contaminated and turn toxic if left
unrefrigerated for more than a few minutes.
The truth is that the potatoes,
onions, and eggs in these products are more likely to
harbor harmful bacteria than the mayonnaise. Commercial
mayonnaise has been pasteurized and has a pH of about 4,
which is a level of acidity hostile to most pathogens.
In fact, the mayonnaise may actually aid in keeping the
potatoes, onions, and eggs from killing us if they are
allowed to sit at room temperature for a while.
This myth may hark back to the
days when folks used homemade mayonnaise which may have
been made with contaminated eggs. If that were the case,
the mayonnaise would have provided an ideal environment
for the salmonella to flourish and multiply, but no such
threat exists with commercially prepared mayonnaise.
Please don't regard this as
permission to allow your potato salad to sit in the hot
sun for several days before serving it. Just don't panic
if your picnic basket warms up a little on your way to
the park.
Food Myth
#6
- Fruit juices are an essential part of a healthy diet
Everyone knows that fruits and
vegetables are essential to a healthy diet, but the same
cannot be said for fruit juices. While fruits contain
vitamins, minerals, and fiber (remember, fiber is our
friend), most fruit juices contain little more that
water and sugar. Okay, so some of the sugar may be
natural, but you would be amazed at how many fruit
juices on the market contain added sugars, especially in
the form of the ubiquitous high-fructose corn syrup.
Unfortunately, advocating fruit juices as part of a
healthy diet is tantamount to touting Coca Cola as a
healthy drink. Eat your fresh fruits, but leave the
bottled, jarred, and boxed fruit juices on the
supermarket shelves.
Food Myth
#7
- A calorie is a calorie is a calorie...
Actually, this one is basically true. A calorie is
defined as a unit of energy, or as Wikipedia puts it,
"The kilogram calorie, large calorie, food calorie,
Calorie (capital C) or just calorie (lowercase c) is the
amount of energy required to raise the temperature of
one kilogram of water by one degree Celsius." Americans
usually use the term calorie, and most other English
speakers prefer the term kilocalorie, but they are both
units of energy. When used in reference to food,
calories represent the amount of energy provided by the
food that is available to our bodies. So, from a
technical standpoint, a calorie (or kilocalorie) is a
calorie (or kilocalorie) is a calorie (or... you get the
idea.)
However, some calories are better than others. Some
of the things we eat and drink provide energy in the
form of calories and little or nothing else in the way
of nutrition. Foods that fall into this category include
all sugars (glucose, sucrose, fructose, dextrose,
maltose, and all the other -oses) and alcohol. So when
you eat or drink things that are primarily sugar (most
soft drinks and fruit juices) or alcohol (especially
distilled liquors such as whisky and vodka), you are
pumping calories into your body and receiving nothing
(or very little) of nutritional value.
On the other hand, if you consume the same number of
calories in the form of fruits, vegetables, meats,
seafood, dairy products, and even such "taboo" foods as
fats and complex carbohydrates, you are consuming
valuable nutrients including proteins, amino acids,
phytochemicals, vitamins, minerals, antioxidants,
micronutrients, and tons of other good stuff along with
the calories.
Whether you think of them as "good" calories and
"bad" calories, or "smart" calories and "dumb" calories,
not all calories are treated in the same way by our
bodies, so even though all calories are equal in terms
of energy potential, it is clear that some calories are
more equal than others from a nutritional standpoint.
 Food Myth
#8 - You shouldn't
wash mushrooms because they'll soak up water like
little sponges
This food myth has been
addressed by many people in many forums, yet it
persists. First of all, like most of the foods we
eat, mushrooms are about 80 percent water in the
first place, so would it really be so bad if they
soaked up a little more water when you wash them? I
think not. The simple truth is they don't soak up
any more water when rinsed than broccoli does.
This was demonstrated by
Harold McGee, author of "On Food and Cooking - The
Science and Lore of the Kitchen." He soaked six
ounces of mushrooms in water for five minutes. When
he drained them and weighed them again, he found to
they had gained about 1/4 ounce, or 1 1/2 teaspoons
of water. The cooks at America's Test Kitchen
repeated his experiment and subjected six ounces of
broccoli to the same procedure as well. They found
that the broccoli had gained the same amount of
weight in water and reasoned that the gain in weight
in both cases was due to water clinging to the
surface. They both "absorbed" the same amount of
water, and no one has ever warned against washing
broccoli because it will soak up water.
So go ahead and wash your
mushrooms before you eat them, unless you really
want to add a little bit of the "stuff" they grow in
to your diet. Do be sure to wash them immediately
prior to using them because a little additional
moisture will cause the mushrooms to become
unpleasantly slimy, but that has nothing to do with
absorbing water.
Food Myth
#9 - You
absolutely, positively must drink at least eight
glasses of water every day
I have already written about
this myth at great length in my critically acclaimed
essay "All About Water," but I could hardly do a
thorough job of exploring common food myths without
taking a good close look at it now, could I? I
thought not.
Rather than going into great
detail here, I'll just give you the short version:
It is true that most people require about two liters
(two quarts) of water per day. What this myth
ignores is the fact that most of us get plenty of
water without having to drink eight glasses of the
stuff. This is because all of the water in the foods
we eat and all the water in the drinks we drink
counts as part of that two liters. Most of the foods
we eat are composed primarily of water, and most of
the things we drink are almost entirely water, so
getting your two liters a day is really pretty easy.
For more information on the origins of this myth and
the water content of some of the things we eat and
drink, please see "All
About Water."
Food
Myth #10 - Salting meat before cooking
will make it dry and tough
This food myth is bandied about perhaps more than any
other. It's true that salted meat, if left alone long
enough, will lose some of its water content and become
drier and more firm in texture. This isn't always a bad
thing, and it is to this process that the world owes
such delicacies as ham, bacon, corned beef, salami, and
pastrami. However, salting a steak, pork chop, or
hamburger shortly before cooking it does nothing more
than season the meat, and everyone prefers their meat
well seasoned so feel free to salt at will.
 Food Myth
#11 - All the alcohol will burn off when
it is cooked
The logic behind this food myth
is that alcohol, which has a lower boiling point than
water, will be completely evaporated by the time the
water in the pot or pan comes to a boil. It is true that
ethanol (the alcohol in wine, beer, and distilled
spirits) has a boiling point of only 173F (78.4C) versus
212F (100C) for water. The trouble with this theory is
that a liquid composed of water and ethanol actually has
a boiling point somewhere between the two. That means
that both the water and the ethanol are being released
as vapor at the same time when the liquid comes to a
boil, and not one followed by the other. Granted, the
alcohol will boil away at a slightly faster rate, but
laboratory experiments reveal that some alcohol remains
even after prolonged boiling. And, contrary to what you
might have heard from certain TV chefs who really should
get their facts straight before spouting off before
millions of viewers, igniting the alcohol does not "burn
the alcohol off." It just ignites the ethanol vapor that
is being created by the evaporation and does nothing to
speed the process up.
Food Myth #12
- Adding salt to a pot of beans will make the beans
tough
I have heard this from several otherwise reliable
sources, and it just isn't true according to Harold
McGee, author of "On Food and Cooking: The Science and
Lore of the Kitchen." He explains that acidic
ingredients such as tomatoes will react with compounds
in the skins of beans and make them tough. However, the
only effect of adding salt is to make the beans cook
considerably faster. Go ahead and salt your beans
whenever you want with no fear of negative consequences.
Food Myth
#13 - Adding salt to water will make it
boil faster
I don't know who dreamed this
one up because it's not only wrong, it's downright
backwards. Adding salt to water actually raises the
boiling point a little, so it takes the water a few
seconds longer to reach a boil. We add salt to water in
order to flavor the foods we are boiling, so unless you
prefer your foods salt-free, go ahead and add salt. Some
misinformed pundits will tell you that it is important
to add the salt at the last minute, but neither the
salt, the water, nor the foods about to be cooked care
when the salt is added. I always add it when I put the
pot on the stove as a matter of habit so I don't have to
worry about remembering whether I have added the salt or
not when it comes time to add the food - I would rather
admit to having a less-than-perfect memory than
over-salt my food.
 Food Myth #14
- Leaving an avocado pit in a bowl of guacamole will
prevent the guacamole from turning brown
It's amazing to me that this myth has been around for
so long because it's so easy to disprove. Go ahead and
try it and see what happens. Brown guacamole, anyone?
The guacamole will turn brown no matter how many avocado
pits you put in it. This is caused by certain compounds
in the avocado reacting with oxygen in the air. One way
to minimize this reaction is to add some acid to the mixture, and it's always a good idea to add a little
lime or lemon juice to your guacamole anyway. But the
best way to prevent your guacamole from turning brown is
to cover it by placing a sheet of plastic wrap directly
on the surface of the guacamole.
Food Myth
#15 - Pork must be cooked until it's
well-done
Back in the days when pigs were
fed garbage, some pigs became infected with the round
worm Trichinella spiralis left in the droppings
of rats and mice that were also eating the garbage.
Uncooked garbage was banned as pork feed in the United
States in 1980, and since then fewer than ten cases of
trichinosis have been reported annually - and most of
those came from eating contaminated wild game. While
many people prefer their pork well-done (probably
because that's the way they have always eaten it), it is
perfectly safe to eat pork that is still slightly pink.
The trichinosis cysts are destroyed when the meat is
cooked to a temperature of 137F (58C) or when the meat
is frozen for at least 20 days. It is generally
considered safe to eat pork that has been cooked to an
internal temperature of 150F (65C) at which point it is
slightly pink and moist.
Food Myth
#16 - Boiling vegetables destroys all
the nutrients
You might have heard your
grandmother say that boiling vegetables destroys all the
nutrients, but she wouldn't have said that if she had
access to a modern chemistry laboratory. If Grandma had
a lab she would have known that, while some vitamins
might leach into the water and be lost when the
vegetables are drained, most of the other nutrients
(i.e. carbohydrates, fats, proteins, and minerals) are
unaffected by boiling. In fact, modern food science now
knows that some vegetables are actually better for us if
they are cooked. For example, the amount of lycopene in
tomatoes and the amount of beta carotene in carrots both
increase with cooking. Cooking also neutralizes some of
the bitter (and slightly toxic) alkaloids that many
plants produce as a defense against being eaten. The
best way (your grandmother's lab would have shown) to
cook vegetables from a nutrition standpoint is to nuke
them in the microwave, with steaming and boiling
following close behind.
Food Myth
#17 - Adding oil to pasta water will
keep the pasta from sticking together
This one is just plain wrong.
Keep in mind that the pasta is at the bottom of the pot,
and the oil is floating on top of the water. Even if a
little oil comes into contact with the pasta when it is
added to the pot, the oil will wash off immediately and
float back to the top of the water. Because the oil does
funny things to the surface tension of the water, it
will help prevent the water from bubbling up and boiling
over, but if your pot of pasta is boiling over and the
pasta is sticking together, then your are doing one
thing wrong - use a bigger pot and both problems will go
away.
 Food
Myth #18 - You shouldn't store bananas
in the refrigerator
Beliefs about refrigerating bananas range from
"refrigerating bananas will spoil them" to "storing
bananas in the refrigerator makes them toxic." Both
sentiments are erroneous. Bananas ripen quickly at room
temperature, and I think all of us have had a banana go
past the ripe stage into inedible territory seemingly in
the blink of an eye. The smart thing to do is to pop
your bananas into the fridge when they are at the stage
of ripeness you prefer. The cooler temperature will slow
the ripening process and you'll get several more days
out of your bananas this way. Be warned that the skin
will turn black (and I suspect this was the reason for
the myth), but the banana inside will remain much as it
was when it entered cold storage.
Food Myth
#19 - Foods cooked in aluminum cookware
will rot your brain
Okay, I may have overstated this
one a bit, but there is a widespread belief that the
small amounts of aluminum that enter our diet from
aluminum cookware are responsible for Alzheimer's
disease. It is true that elevated levels of aluminum
have been found in the brains of some Alzheimer's
patients, but there is no evidence that the aluminum
caused the disease. In fact, it appears that the
elevated levels of aluminum that one team of researchers
found were due to a faulty testing procedure, and when
extra precautions were taken tests showed that the
brains of Alzheimer's patients have no more aluminum
than the general population. Keep in mind that aluminum
is the most abundant metal in the Earth's crust, and
there is a little tiny bit of it in just about
everything we eat and drink - it even composes part of
the dust in the air we breathe. Scientists are quick to
point out that if aluminum were a major factor in the
development of Alzheimer's disease, it is likely that
many more people would suffer from it due simply to the
pervasiveness of aluminum. The bottom line is there is
no reason to shun aluminum cookware, aluminum foil,
aluminum cans, or even antiperspirant deodorant (have
you ever checked the active ingredient there?) because
of adverse health effects.
Food Myth
#20 - Throw a strand of spaghetti
against the wall and, if it sticks, it's done
Whose idea was this, anyway? Go
ahead and try it. You'll find that, in addition to
making a mess of your wall, the spaghetti will stick
when it's undercooked and overcooked as well as when
it's cooked just right, so you've proved nothing. The
only sure way to know when pasta is done is to taste it,
and what's so hard about that? I mean, would you throw a
spoonful of tomato sauce against the wall to see if it
has enough salt? No, you would taste it, wouldn't you? I
swear some food myths must have been dreamed up by
someone suffering from brain damage. Sheesh.
Food
Myth #21 - Butter will spoil if not
refrigerated constantly
This myth probably gained
currency because other dairy products are quick to turn
bad. That's because other dairy products contain
proteins and water, two essential elements if bacteria
are to grow and multiply. Since butter is almost 100
percent fat, harmful bacteria find little to sustain
them. Granted, butter will eventually go bad no matter
how it is stored, but it is more likely to go rancid
(the effect of oxidation caused by exposure to air and
light) rather than spoil due to bacterial contamination,
so go ahead and let your butter sit at room temperature
if you plan on using it any time soon.
Food
Myth #22 - Fresh foods are healthier
than processed foods
Depending on the process in
question, processed foods are often at least as
nutritious, if not more nutritious than their fresh
counterparts. Frozen fruits and vegetables, for example,
are typically picked, processed, and frozen at the peak
of their perfection, whereas the fresh produce on your
supermarket shelves has often been picked out of season,
then jostled about for days or weeks before it finally
arrives in your store. Many of the vitamins in fresh
fruits and vegetables are depleted by the time they
reach your dinner table, no matter how carefully they
were handled in transit. Some nutrients are actually
increased during processing (the lycopene in tomatoes,
for example), and some processed foods are nutritionally
enhanced in order to provide health benefits unavailable
from the unprocessed products. Iodized salt, vitamin-D
milk, and many enriched breads and breakfast cereals are
examples of foods that are actually improved by
processing.
Food
Myth #23 - Baking powder and baking
soda will last indefinitely
Actually, this one is half
right. Baking powder is a mixture of chemicals which
produce carbon dioxide when they react with each other,
and this reaction is hastened by the presence of water.
Unfortunately, this reaction is also hastened by the
moisture in the air, so the clock starts ticking as soon
as you open the box of baking powder, and you'll be
lucky if it lasts more than six months. To test your
baking powder, dissolve a little bit of it in some warm
water. If it fizzes, you're good to go. If it doesn't
fizz, toss it and replace it. Baking soda, on the other
hand, will last indefinitely if stored in a cool, dry
place.
Food Myth
#24 - Pasta should
be rinsed after it is cooked
Wrong, absolutely wrong.
Rinsing pasta after it is cooked will wash away the
thin layer of starch that is clinging to it, and
that starch is necessary if you want your sauce to
cling to the pasta. This same layer of starch is
what makes pasta stick to itself when it cools, so
rinse your pasta only if you are planning to reheat
it in boiling water before serving (an old
restaurant trick) or if you plan to serve it cold,
as in a pasta salad. Otherwise, rinsing your pasta
is strictly forbidden.
To be continued.
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2009 Worldwide Recipes. All rights reserved. |
