TransWikia.com

Metal dust/shavings in food from knife wear?

Seasoned Advice Asked by NiklasJ on February 17, 2021

I’ve been wondering about this for a while, since getting interested in knife sharpening.

When using a knife, it will get duller. One (the primary) reason being that you “bend” the edge. You fix this using a honing steel.

After a while though, you need to sharpen the knife again.
Another setting: If you have a brittle knife and/or mistreat your knife you will chip it.

As far as I can tell, this should mean that small pieces of metal (dust, shavings, etc.) come lose, and then likely get in the food.

Is this correct?
Are there no health considerations when digesting small pieces of very sharp metal?

3 Answers

At a microscopic level metal is malleable, and so the edge tends to bend rather than spall or break off. Still, it is probably technically true to a certain extent, and based on many many years of metal knife usage by millions or billions of people through history, completely irrelevant. Whatever effect it may have is vanishingly small.

Correct answer by SAJ14SAJ on February 17, 2021

Sure, microscopic bits of metal go into your food when you use knives. It's just a bit more iron in your diet. When you consider that the average person eats 100mg of dirt per day the nanograms of metal you eat per year is pretty insignificant.

Answered by GdD on February 17, 2021

Microscopic metal particles won't hurt you. The iron in fortified breakfast cereal is just food-grade iron particles. You can collect them with a magnet.

Answered by Kenster on February 17, 2021

Add your own answers!

Ask a Question

Get help from others!

© 2024 TransWikia.com. All rights reserved. Sites we Love: PCI Database, UKBizDB, Menu Kuliner, Sharing RPP