How to Clean Vegetables from Bacterial Residue?

January 22, 2019 Leave a Comment

While most studies show that Americans don't eat the fruit and vegetables they should, there are still a lot of fruit and vegetables consumed in the United States each year. Onions, cucumbers and lettuce rank among the most consumed vegetables while bananas, watermelon, and tomatoes (yes, tomatoes are considered a fruit) are among the most consumed fruits. Many of our fruits and vegetables are grown fresh and processed in the United States and undergo a cleaning process that many Americans assume is sufficient. According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), however, "48 million people are sickened by food contaminated with harmful germs each year," and the source of that sickness comes from fruits and vegetables. This is because while many Americans understand the need to clean animal products, many do not take cleaning and sanitizing fruits and vegetables as serious. Even those vegetables grown in your own garden should be cleaned to avoid health risks, and when you are getting vegetables from another source, cleaning is particularly important because you have no idea how those vegetables have been processed.

Common Bacteria Found on Fruits and Vegetables

Recent documented outbreaks of human sickness known to be caused from consuming raw vegetables and fruits has increased. Many of these outbreaks can even be traced to unpasteurized fruit juices. According to the CDC, "The overall number of Campylobacter, Listeria, Salmonella, Shigella, Vibrio, and Yersinia infections increased 96% in 2017." Outbreaks where the causes have been identified were mostly of bacterial origin. The most frequent of those outbreaks were identified as being Salmonella and E. coli linked to carrots, lettuce, scallions, and parsley and cholera linked to strawberries, both fresh and frozen.

How to Clean Vegetables from Bacterial Residue

While the FDA recommends always washing vegetables and fruits, cleaning isn't enough if you want to be certain they are free of bacteria that is commonly found on fruits and vegetables. Even with a thorough washing, bacteria can still remain on vegetables. According to the FDA, the minimum cleaning process involves washing your hands with warm water for at least 20 seconds before handling any fruits or vegetables, then thoroughly rinsing before peeling the vegetables. Finally, it's important to use a vegetable brush to gently scrub the vegetables. The FDA also recommends throwing away any bruised or damaged fruits or vegetables.


Unfortunately, not all bacteria are washed away so easily. The recent recall of Romaine lettuce in certain parts of the country is testament to that fact. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), "On December 13, 2018, Adam Bros. Farming, Inc., in Santa Barbara County recalled red leaf lettuce, green leaf lettuce and cauliflower products harvested on November 27 through 30, 2018 because they may have been contaminated with E coli. The CDC issued a warning that suggested consumers "not eat and retailers and restaurants not serve or sell any romaine lettuce harvested from certain counties in the Central Coastal growing regions of northern and central California." Even with standard cleaning processes, bacteria of all kinds can remain on vegetables. That's why taking the extra precaution to clean, and even disinfect, vegetables is so important. With all of this in mind, there is certainly nothing wrong with sanitizing and disinfecting your fruits and vegetables regardless of where you get them.


The problem with using commercial sanitizers and disinfectants on vegetables is that many of them can pose as much danger as the bacteria itself. Many store-bought cleaners and disinfectants contain chemicals that can remain on fruits and vegetables and can be harmful if consumed. Since so many disinfectants contain chemicals, how do you clean vegetables from bacterial residue that could cause illness to your family? Is there a non-toxic disinfectant that can be used to clean bacteria from vegetables?

GenEon Has the Solution

It is essential to have a proven way to kill spore, viruses, and bacteria for any cleaning or sanitizing product meant to be used around food, including restaurants and open-air markets, and grocery stores. This is the only way to make sure germs are effectively eliminated from all surfaces. This is important to keeping work environments safe and for keeping all areas that food will come into contact with safe and sanitized. At GenEon, we offer consumers a safer, less toxic solution to this problem. Our powerful, eco-friendly cleaning products include heavy duty degreasers that meet the complex needs of the food industry.

Our products utilize energy, water, and minerals. Our proprietary Electrolyte allows you to harness the power of natural minerals to make the cleaning, sanitizing ,and disinfecting solutions you need in an environmentally friendly and cost-effective manner. Using our Electrolyte and a catalyst, you can generate glass cleaner, carpet cleaners, degreasing solutions, or all-purpose cleaner. Our Electrolytes are food-based additives and classified as GRAS (Generally Regarded As Safe) by the U.S. FDA. Our cleaners, sanitizers, degreasers, and disinfectants are generated by customers on site using on-site generation technology. This means you only need to make what you need for a specific job, eliminating the need to store harmful chemical cleaners. Our products are cost effective and safer than traditional store cleaners, making them ideal for homeowners and for businesses of all types, especially those that deal with food on a regular basis.


At GenEon, we take pride in the products we deliver and their effectiveness when it comes to killing germs. Laboratory tests in accordance with the AOAC protocols have determined that GenEon solutions kill greater than 99.999% of common germs in less than 30 seconds. This includes potentially dangerous bacteria such as c. difficile, Listeria, MRSA, Staph, VRE, Pseudomonas, Norovirus, Salmonella, E. coli O157:H7, Bacillus subtilis, Polio, Bacteriophage, and TB. More importantly, although our cleaning, sanitizing, and disinfecting solutions are safer for the environment, people, and pets, they are still powerful enough to eliminate harmful germs. Also, our disinfectant solution is ideal for cleaning bacterial residue from vegetables and fruits. Our effort to create true non-toxic cleaners has produced products using water, natural and electricity and is much safer than traditional cleaning chemicals.

We've also taken great steps to meet the cleaning and safety challenges demanded by the retail food industry by developing high quality cleaning supplies and delivering them worldwide. We've even recognized the need to overcome communication barriers that can often come into play and lead to potential hazards. Instead of consumers who use our products around the world needing to be instructed on the specific wording of our products in an already busy retail environment, we have color coded our cleaning solutions so anyone knows what to use in specific circumstances. This reduces the possibility of misuse or damage to any surfaces if an employee was to misread or misunderstand the wording of one of our cleaning supplies. Our simple color-coded system allows for straightforward communication to users everywhere so that less effort is needed to remember product names and more time can be spent on productive business operations.

To learn more about GenEon and our line of cleaning and disinfecting solutions, and cleaning technology, call 866.217.0205. For Residential you can buy directly online at Trio H2Ome. For Commercial interest please call 866.217.0205 and we will be happy to assist you with finding the right cleaning solutions for your food-related business.


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