Glass work-top ...

[Owain]

This is often the case with work canteens - one gets one's pudding at the same time as one's starter and main, to save queueing twice in a limited lunch time.

Owain

[Steve Firth]

Ah well, I suppose you and the others posting their views about eating off the counter serve dinner by throwing it onto the floor or in a trough?

[Arfa Daily]

That's the sort of way that I think I am leaning now. I am going to explore the large gloss floor tile route I think. I saw some in B&Q the other day, and they were only a few quid each. I reckon four of those, suitably cut down to make the size I want, with some of that glossy black work-surface jointing compound to grout them, might be just the job ...

Arfa

[Arfa Daily]

Where do you get that from ? I never said anything about eating food directly off a counter top. Although actually, it is absolutely standard practice in the food business, to prep food directly off a stainless steel surface. It is also absolutely standard practice to prepare such things as dough directly off a cold surface. Is eating from a trough something that you have direct experience of, perhaps ? I guess also, if you have no concept of such eating habits, you've never had the joys of children ?

Arfa

[Mary Fisher]

I agree. Glass, marble, slate, granite and other designer worktops are death to knives. Wood is perfect. We have several boards for different foods but that's for practical reasons rather than hygienic ones.

Ooh, don't you sterilise the cream bfore putting it in the cake?

Mary

[Mary Fisher]

Don't you breathe?

Mary

[Mary Fisher]

But the pudding would be cold ... the custard congealed ...

Bleurch!

We had to queue twice at school even for cold (salad) meals and cold puddings. There were two sittings too, wonder how they did it? We never felt rushed.

Mary

[Steve Firth]

I wonder how many times I have to point out that I know more about microbiology than the majority of people posting here? Use of countertops for the preparation of food and particularly for use as a cutting surface is both gross and a breach of best practice. Given that the cleaning that most people will give such a surface is a wipe with a germ-infested rag or sponge, that makes it even worse. Personally I find that cutting boards can be sterilised effectively in the dishwasher.

[Doki]

It'll happen sooner or later is my experience.

[Steve Firth]

I went sailing with such a person. They were being generally clueless on deck so they got sent to make sandwiches for lunch. Every application of butter ended up with them lickign their fingers and hand. At frequent intervals they wiped the knifeblade with their fingers. The bread was buttered on the work surface, the bread was then moved to the companionway step where the filling was added, then the sandwiches were passed up to the cockpit by hand (no plate or serviette) where the crew took said sandwiches and threw them overboard. Dorkperson then appered in the cockpit, sandwich in each hand and said "oh, have you finished already?"

[Stephen Howard]

It seems that stainless steel isn't all that good either - quite a few germs will live on it quite happily for a number of days. Copper, on the other hand, has rather good antibacterial properties and there's some discussion regarding the merits of using it in hospitals. Trouble is, it's not that practical a work surface - but an alloy might well be.

As for the trough comment...wait 'till he sees what's on his toothbrush...

Regards,

[Steve Firth]

Excellent, although so many of you seem to contracted a parasite that eats brains.

[Steve Firth]

As in incorrect use of ellipsis?

[Stephen Howard]

If you can't work that out then you perhaps shouldn't be posting to Usenet.

As with all things, there's a healthy balance to be struck that neither leans towards dangerous practices nor errs on the side of paranoia. - and the vast majority of us made it through childhood without the benefit of dishwashers, antibacterial sprays and squeaky clean worksurfaces.

[Rod]

Such as using it to indicate aposiopesis...

[Stephen Howard]

Indeed, I've heard it's the grammar that goes first...

[Steve Firth]

One should consider use the appropriate printers mark for that purpose, unless-

[Arfa Daily]

I guess the same way that they managed to fit in maths and english every day, geography and history twice a week, PE twice a week, games one whole afternoon a week, languages (two with two periods each), physics chemistry and biology as separate subjects, each with at least one double period and one single per week, R.E., music, probably some others that I've long since forgotten about, a proper assembly every morning, a lunch hour and two breaks every day, and still it didn't feel like you were doing too much ...

Arfa

[PeterMcC]

Steve Firth wrote in

OE really is useless, that last mark looks just like a hyphen :)

[Arfa Daily]

The trouble is that everyone is paranoid now about this sort of thing, so no one builds up any immunity to the general bugs that are around now, and always have been. Whilst in our family we do not behave in a filthy way, or go out of our way to be 'dangerous' in the preparation of our food, by the same token, we do not go around sterilising everything, and sluicing everything all the time with antibacterial solutions. It's the way that I was brought up in the 50s / 60s by my own parents, and it's the way that we have brought up three of our own kids, who have all been thoroughly healthy throughout their childhood, and still are now as independant adults in their own right. I'm sure that you will have some clever answer to that, being an expert microbiologist and all that, but really, I don't care. If you think that the way I live is gross, then that's your problem, not mine. But know that the use of stainless steel worksurfaces in professional food prep *is* common practice, whether you like it or not, and irrespective of whether you consider it "gross" or a "breach of best practice", so you would probably be best advised to never eat anything that has been prepared anywhere other than in your own kitchen, under your control ...

Arfa