Poll: Food that touched the floor, do you eat it ?

[Yopaz]

If its something like a chip of course ill eat it. the floor is more healthy anyway.

This made me laugh so much. Thank you for brightening my evening.

OT: As other have said, depends on the food depends on the floor. Chips are fine since they don't generally soak up dust because they're dry, light and have a relatively low density. If the floor is relatively clean and dry I will eat it. If I drop a bowl of soup then you can be sure that I won't eat it and I will clean the floor. Anything that sticks is really a no go, it's also a shame to drop because it dirties the floor.

It should be mentioned that I live in one of those countries where it's almost unthinkable to wear shoes inside which helps the matter.

The 5 second rule is bullshit. I wouldn't eat something that I don't know how long has been on the floor or something that has dropped out of my sight where I can't see the conditions of the floor.

I don't know what the last time I ate off the floor was. I am poor so I make sure my food doesn't touch the floor.

 

[Harlemura]

I follow the myth of the 5 second rule. Because I live on the edge. As long as it's not something moist or gooey that's gonna hold onto all the grime it touches, I'll usually take my chances because I'm a greedy piggy and it was my food dammit.
Besides, it's only a smidge of grime. Gotta give my immune system something to do every now and again. That's my dad's excuse, anyway.

 

[Psychobabble]

That entirely depends on how fast it manages to scuttle away.

 

[talker]

I use the 5 second rule

 

[Artina89]

It depends on the food and where I dropped it. If I drop something on the floor of my bedroom or living room, then I will pick it up and eat it straight away. If I drop something on the staff room floor at work then I wouldn't put it anywhere near my mouth in a million years. Also, if it is something like a boiled sweet, or anything else that is sticky, then I would just throw it away, regardless of where I dropped it.

 

[Miss G.]

Depends on the floor and the food. If I pick it up before 5 seconds and it has very little or no sticky stuff/dirt on it I'm good to go, especially if I'm at home when it happens. Public spaces... its not worth the risk because, despite the first parts of this post, I'm the type to abuse hand sanitizer wherever I go.

 

[DugMachine]

If I can't brush off the cat hair easily then no. Especially nothing that's wet that's for sure

 

[frizzlebyte]

That depends entirely on the food and the surface it's landed on.


Something like a crisp on a hard, dry floor? Fine, I'll pick up that sucker and chow down.

A lolly pop I just dropped on a carpet? Yeah, no, I ain't eating anything fuzzy.

Pretty much my rule, as well, though I tend not to eat much, if anything, if it drops on the carpet, even if the food is dry. And if something round, like a grape, actually rolls on the floor...no.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Depends on the food AND where I dropped it. Naturally if it's something likely to pick up shit and can't be wiped off I'll only eat it off a reasonably clean surface, but if it's something like an apple or a marshmallow I'll eat it unless it was dropped on a particularly dirty surface (after a wipe/wash of course). Basically, on the opposite end of being ignorant of germs, I've seen enough science to know that they're practically everywhere and am now apathetic. I only care about physical detritus.

To answer your questions, I don't use a time rule, if I saw it drop onto the floor I'll exercise the same judgment I normally would, if it was dropped beforehand I probably won't eat it only because I don't know what's happened to it. A piece of Nutrigrain off my kitchen floor this morning.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

Before I had a dog I used the 5 second rule.

Now if it hits the floor then it's gone forever. That and I like to think that my dog has Jedi powers and made it so I would drop something on the floor so he can eat it, so I just let it go because, who am I to begrudge the little guy a snack?

Unless it's something spicy, then I'm all "Ah hell naw!" and "oh God, noooooooo!".

I'm trying to think of the carpet people.

 

[Silverbeard]

I just accidentally dropped a chip on the floor in my house . While not my last chip , i stood there for a second trying to decide if i should pick it up and eat it . My mother always told me to never , ever , eat any food that touched the floor. Others have told be of their 5 to 30 second rule ( basically if it was on de floor for less than 5 to 30 seconds , depending on who you ask , it's safe to eat ). Growing up i never( knowingly ) ate anything that fell on the floor, appart from when i was a toddler of course . This time was no different , i picked up the chip and threw it out .

So my question is: when you drop food on the floor, do you pick it up and eat it?

And as a bonus question : if you do eat food that dropped on the floor , how long before you deem it's no longer edible?

Also out of curiosity , what was the last thing you ate off the floor?

I work at a clinical microbiology lab. The things I've seen would make you wretch out your guts. And then step on them to kill the horrors that dwell within.
Some days eating anything is beyond my ability.

 

[KoudelkaMorgan]

I eat it if it is wash able or if I can cut off the part that touched the floor. If a strawberry hits the floor, I wash it off. If idk, a slice of cake hits the floor, I eat the part that didn't.

If meat touches the floor it goes in the garbage.

 

[Angie7F]

Depends where I dropped it.
But usually I dont care much.
I am not OCD and can share my food with my dog

 

[Auron225]

As others have said, depends on the floor & food. The 5 second rule is bullcrap - germs will be on whatever it is within microseconds but even so;

If its a bit of meat or veg (any kind of "proper food") then no.
If its chocolate or something "not proper", then its actually probably fine.

Unless it lands on/in something unpleasent, then of course it isn't ok.

 

[Estelindis]

A friend of mine did some research on the five-second rule in her biology lab at our university (in her own time, just because she was curious; this wasn't funded research). She found no basis for the five-second rule. There was a negligible difference in the amount of bacteria on food that had been on the floor for five seconds and food that had been there longer, compared to a baseline/control of food that had not been dropped at all. This applied to all variations of wet and dry foods dropped on wet and dry surfaces. Just thought that you might find this interesting.

Personally, I would eat certain foods that drop on certain floors, e.g. a crisp that fell on my kitchen floor that I'd recently cleaned, but the rest is off-limits.

 

[EeveeElectro]

I have 4 cats who usually jump on each other to get food that I drop.
Or in some cases put their paws on my plate and help themselves. Or steal the food off my fork as it's travelling towards my gob.

Anyway, like others said, no to wet food, yes if it's dry and I'm at home and isn't covered in cat hair.

I'm not that desperate for food though XD

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

The likelihood of me picking up food on the floor depends on the food and the floor, but increases exponentially with the units of alcohol consumed. The new year before last, I dropped a slice of pizza in a gutter (it had been raining a lot too), scraped off some gravel and chowed down. I'd like to say I don't do that anymore, but the other night I had a snail-eating competition (if you're wondering, I won. I'm not sure if I should be proud of that).

If I'm sober I'm a bit less cavalier about it, but it's still not really a big deal provided there's not much actual stuff stuck on it. What do you people think is going to get on it that's so terrible? I live in suburban England, not a Mumbai slum where I'll catch dysentery from looking at a puddle. I'm pretty sure we're built to handle most of the shit I'll come into contact with from the ground, and most of it's probably on the walls, doorhandles and fucking everything anyway. So long as there are no actual physical pieces of excrement you're probably ok.

That said, if I had pets, fuck that shit. A past girlfriend of mine had cats and the only places in the house that weren't covered in hair and vomit were where the cats were eating the vomit. And the litter box.