Fruit & Veggie Wash: 3 Easy-to-Follow Steps for Cleaner Produce

Little ones love to explore things with their mouths. As much as we want to keep them from putting toys and other household objects in their mouths, baby-mouthing is a normal developmental stage.¹ Luckily, we have easy how-to tips for cleaning your children’s toys that will keep their things spotless and their smiles wide. However, what about the things we want our children to put in their mouths, like fruits and veggies?

Part of being a new parent is picking the best food options for your children. Fruit and veggies are two major components of a balanced diet, but the not-so-healthy passengers they bring into your kitchen are not part of the equation.

We’ve put together three helpful produce wash tips to help you remove pesticides and bacteria and keep your children healthy.

Why Should You Wash Produce?

Toddlers and berries go together like peas in a pod. They are bite-sized, delicious, and perfect for little hands, so we want to make sure they are free of any bad stuff like pesticides and bacteria first.

Pesticides are widely used in the United States and found in most produce.² Some studies have shown links between pesticide exposure and negative health and behavioral issues.² Produce can also carry harmful bacteria such as Salmonella, E. coli, and Listeria that can make the whole family sick.³

We recommend doing a simple veggie wash before cooking or feeding produce to your children. Be aware that you should avoid using regular detergent or bleach on your produce. It’s far more likely that even after rinsing your fruits and veggies soap or bleach residue may be left behind, since many fruit and veggie skins are porous.⁴

3 Steps to Wash Produce

All produce, including produce you plan on peeling, should be thoroughly washed to help remove pesticides and bacteria. Here’s how you can use ECOS Fruit + Veggie Wash (also available in ECOS Organic Fruit + Veggie Wash) to thoroughly clean produce for your family:

• Step 1: Spray ECOS Fruit + Veggie Wash, thoroughly coating your produce, then let sit for approximately 1-2 minutes.
• Step 2: Rinse your produce under cold running water for approximately 15-20 seconds. Make this part a fun learning moment for your toddler by having them help! You can time yourself by singing the “Happy Birthday” song twice. For veggies with tougher skins, use a vegetable brush or rub them with your hands.4
• Step 3: For leafy greens, we recommend soaking them in a solution of 10 parts water to 1 part ECOS Fruit + Veggie Wash. Let your produce soak for 2-3 minutes, stir around to remove any loose dirt, and rinse thoroughly under cold running water.

Handle Messes the ECOS Way

What else goes along with toddlers and berries? Berry messes. On their clothes, on the floor, on the carpet. Toddlers may be small, but some of the messes they make can be big. For those instances, handle it with a powerful stain remover that’s also a safer alternative to bleach.

Scrubbing is hard. Washing your toddler’s clothing and seeing a berry stain after the second attempt is frustrating. You’ve already done the important work using a veggie wash for cleaner produce, so let ECOS OxoBrite® Multi-Purpose Stain Remover handle the rest of the cleanup.

And for those tougher stains on your toddler’s clothing, like berry juice, we recommend that you let their clothing soak in OxoBrite® first. Add two scoops per gallon of water and soak up to four hours before washing clothing as usual.

If you’re still struggling with stains on your children’s clothing, new parents, fret not, because we’ve got a whole list of stain-busting recommendations, tips, and baby-safe cleaning products in our How to Remove Stains from Baby Clothes blog article.

Unfortunately, toddler clothing isn’t the only thing that gets messy. Carpets, sofas, and other fabric furniture are all fair game for those sticky fingers. When your home needs some spot cleaning, here are a few more tips that can help:

1. Add a ½ scoop of ECOS OxoBrite® Multi-Purpose Stain Remover per 16 oz. (2 cups) of water
2. Apply the dissolved OxoBriteⓇ to the stain and let it stand for 5-30 minutes without letting the solution dry out.
3. Blot the coated area with a towel to soak up the liquid. Check the stain and repeat these steps as needed until the stain is removed.
4. Rinse the area with water and blot it dry. For best results, treat any stains as soon as they occur.

Give Your Children the Safer, Cleaner Choice with ECOS

New parents, your job is to provide your baby with the best start to life possible, and you’ve already started them on their path to a healthy life by picking nutritious food options. Let ECOS Fruit + Veggie Wash be your partner in ensuring those foods you picked for your child deliver only the good stuff.

As for the rest of your home, you’ve got enough on your plate to stress over your toddler mouthing the TV remote. Take a load off your shoulders (and to-do list) and trust in ECOS’s full line of plant-powered household cleaning products to help keep your home clean with safer ingredients.

1. Sources:
   Healthline. Baby Mouthing – A.K.A. Why Do Babies Put Everything in Their Mouths?
   http://www.healthline.com/health/baby/baby-mouthing#reasons
2. National Library of Medicine. Pesticide Exposure and Child Neurodevelopment.
   http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4247335/
3. Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Fruit and Vegetable Safety.
   http://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/communication/steps-healthy-fruits-veggies.html#:~:text=Sometimes%2C%20raw%20fruits%20and%20vegetables,plan%20to%20eat%20the%20peel.
4. Consumer Reports. The Right Way to Wash Produce.
   http://www.consumerreports.org/food-safety/the-right-way-to-wash-produce/