About

Washing Chicken refers to the act of placing raw chicken under running water, with or without various cleaning agents, before cooking it. Online, however, the act and its various ways of being accomplished have been the center of many different arguments and viral debates online in a similar way to the pineapple on pizza debate, with each side having their own arguments for or against the practice. The practice of washing chicken prior to cooking is also a cliche among many Black Americans.

Origin

While washing chicken has been a staple of culinary cleanliness for decades, debates about whether to wash it or not did not quickly cross over onto the internet like other longstanding traditions until sometime during the late 2010s. On March 9th, 2018, YouTuber RM Videos^[1] uploaded a video of a man washing chicken wings in the sink using Dawn dish soap. In the video, he explains that he knows people talk all the time about whether to wash chicken or not, but he always washes it, earning over 257,000 views in five years and sparking several debates in the comments section (shown below).

A year later, on May 8th, 2019, the TV show and YouTube channel Inside Edition^[2] uploaded a video titled "Why You Shouldn't Wash Raw Chicken" in which they detail advice from the CDC on not washing raw chicken because of the likelihood of germs spreading to other kitchen utensils, earning over 268,000 views in four years and reigniting the debate online (shown below).

The method of washing raw chicken before cooking it is prevalent among Black Americans in particular. On January 24th, 2022, the website Black People Recipes^[5] published an article titled "Why Do Black People Wash Chicken" that discusses the association. The author, Brandi Crawford, explained:

Like most Blacks, I grew up washing chicken. Most people wash their chicken because they do so habitually. It’s done out of habit. For years, older generations have washed their chicken, so the custom was simply passed down.

Spread

Washing Chicken continued to be a prominent topic of debate and controversy online during the 2020s, with TikTok quickly succumbing to it after posts about washing chicken started to appear en masse in 2023. On January 4th, 2023, TikToker @lolviralmedia^[3] uploaded a clip of a man being berated by his girlfriend after she found out that he washed their chicken using dish soap, making the chicken have bubbles on it (shown below).

On July 3rd, 2023, Redditor imjustheretodomyjob posted a reference to washing chicken on the /r/blackpeoplegifs^[6] subreddit under the title "I don't care what the FDA or anyone says, you gotta clean your chicken," receiving over 1,600 upvotes and 200 comments in four months (shown below).

The following day, on July 4th, TikToker @aina_007_^[4] reposted the skit with the caption "how black people act when you don't clean chicken," showing the made-up confrontation between a Black man who quotes the CDC ruling on not needing to wash chicken, gets shown the consequences of following it by another man. This TikTok is one of many that specifically note Black people as being extra careful and particular about washing chicken, with many other TikToks involving washing chicken also using generalizations about Black people.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References