Comments by "John h Palmer" (@johnhpalmer6098) on "What silicone is, and why I don't love cooking with it (PODCAST E42)" video.

  1.  @JoshWebb  That is true, even those that have a sani rinse or high temp wash, even the commercial dishwashers only top out at 180F and at that temp, the water flashes off so no need to dry things after a quick run through what it technically called a sanitizer in the commercial units, which is why they can get away with a 5 minute cycle and get dishes really clean for the next table serving.
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  2. This is very good and a few years back, tried to do a deep dive on the rubber scraper (spatula) and little online then about it and my take was to look at it as an indispensable tool in the kitchen as it is used to scrape foods from dishes into another dish or trash. It's been around a long time, and until oh, the past 30 years or so, was largely made of rubber, now mind you, MOST rubbers are man made as natural rubber, made from latex, grows on certain trees that were largely only grown down near the equator, and is limited in quantity as a result, so man made rubber was developed. Most rubber products are man made, and then vulcanized to get it to an elastic state we now think of as rubber. Problem with mostly man made rubber, but natural rubber too is they will degrade after several years, chemicals will leach out, become sticky, shiny, some will crack as they dry out, especially if put in the dishwasher. You may notice this with old pencils, the erasers they have will harden and dry out. This is why many belts in tape decks, be it cassette or R2R etc will often degrade to a gooey mess, or simply loose their elasticity and stretch out from age and why belt drive tables it's often recommended you replace the belts every 5 years or so. That is why I stopped buying rubber spatulas, and began getting silicone ones instead as they are inert, and so far have not had them leach out as they break down. I have 3 silicone ones that I've had for about 18 years, and often cook with them too. They have held up well in hot pans. 2 are a touch discolored from the heat after many years. Yet, they still are stable, have not dried out, nor cracked, nor leached some gross/gooey, sticky chemical. One has lost a corner after many removals of the head to allow water to dry out as they get moldy if I don't do this. I know not all spatulas like the one Adam holds here but many are made to have the heads be removable, and most of mine are like that. I don't have the capability to smell much if at all so am not aware of their holding in odors. I believe America's test Kitchen has tested for their absorption odors as part of their tests and some may be better than others about this, but knowing that tossing them into an oven (mind you minus their handles if possible if the heads are removable) and "bake" them at 400F for several minutes will remove the smell is a good thing.
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