October 20, 2011

Disinfecting Food and Water

Whenever we bring home fresh fruits and veggies from the store or the market that we plan to eat raw, they have to be disinfected.  First, I rinse them off, and then I soak them in water with a couple tablespoons of bleach for 30 minutes.

Since most fruits and veggies float, I press them down completely with a plate and put a weight on it.

If I'm planning to cook the fruits or veggies, however, I only rinse them in tap water.  They don't need to be disinfected first because the heat of cooking kills all the bad stuff.

For drinking water, we have to either buy purified water or filter our tap water.  We have a 5-gallon jug in a dispenser.

The tap water has bacteria, viruses, parasites, and amoebas, so we are very careful not to get it in our mouths.  We have a separate container of water to use for brushing our teeth.

We also have a separate container at the kitchen sink for rinsing the washcloth that I use to clean Veronica's hands and mouth after a meal.

To save money, Michael works diligently at filtering water.  First, he puts tap water into the white filter on the left.  Then he puts that filtered water into a second filter which is in the dark blue bucket up high on the right.  This filter is a siphon, so Michael sucks on the long tube to get it started, and then the water runs down the tube into the 5-gallon jug on the floor. 

For washing dishes, we use regular tap water, and our maid dries each dish with a towel.  We also check our dishes before using them to be sure they are very dry.  For showering, we use tap water but we have a hand towel ready to dry our faces.

In the U.S., we always took clean food and water for granted, but now we have to be more cautious!