Cooking with tap water and salt may end up making your food toxic. As per the researchers from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Nanjing University in China, using iodised table salt and chlorinated tap water for cooking your daily meal may actually add toxins to your food.
Several new molecules were found out when tap water and salt was used for cooking food. The scientists said that if cooking time and temperature could be reduced and salt with iodate could be used, food could be the safest.
Usually, tap water is disinfected by adding molecules called chloramines and chlorine. Chlorine present in the water and salt, when mixed together, could create a kind of an acid called hypoiodous acid.
The concern does not end here, the acid can then react with the food and produce cooking iodinated disinfection byproducts (I-DBPs), which are new to the researchers. This result is relevant to both researchers and the general public.
Researchers analysed I-DBPs by using several types of tap water at different temperatures for various durations. Iodised salt and wheat flour was added to determine what kind of I-DBPs would be formed. About 14 new molecules were found out, out of which nine molecules were put to a test. On testing, it was found that some molecules had 50 to 200 times higher toxic levels than the others.
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