Double Dipping is 'Like Kissing Everybody at the Party'

Last year the food microbiologist [Clemson University professor Paul L. Dawson's] undergraduate students examined the effects of double dipping using volunteers, wheat crackers and several sample dips. They found that three to six double dips transferred about 10,000 bacteria from an eater's mouth to the remaining dip sample.

"I was very surprised by the results," Dawson said in a telephone interview Thursday. "I thought there would be very minimal transfer. I didn't think we would be able to detect it."

The professor said the students' research didn't get into the risk behind such a bacteria transfer, but they got the idea.

"I like to say it's like kissing everybody at the party - if you're double dipping, you're putting some of your bacteria in that dip," Dawson said.