While I was eating today, I was watching ‘Ready Steady Cook‘ on the BBC. During their 10 minutes session they create absolutely astonishing meals, the cooks also answered a question from a viewer. A Dutch viewer. She stated that as everyone knows one should never reheat spinach, but she asked whether it was ok to reheat spinach soup?

Paul Rankin, Antony Worrall Thompson, and Ainsley Harriott were all three very surprised by the statement that one should never reheat spinach. They have never heard such a nonsense.

This was very surprising to me. To never reaheat spinach is such a well-known fact here that is passed from generation to generation (‘kids, whatever you do, do not ever try to reheat spinach’). Even I knew it. You even can get cancer from it. But three well respected chefs won’t be wrong, right?

So, after the show I googled a bit. Apparently, since the beginning of 2005 we are allowed again to reheat spinach. It isn’t dangerous (anymore :)). So, the chefs knew it better than all the Dutch people.

But then there is the question why all the Dutch people thought for ages that one should never reheat spinach, and the elite of the British cooks have never heard of such a story. And not only they, googling for ‘reheating spinach’ doesn’t give any warning about all the dangers at all (and googling for it in dutch gives you at least 5 serious warnings in the first 10 hits…).