You’ve just gotten home from the grocery store with some fresh strawberries. You set them down in the kitchen and walk away for a moment, only to come back and find your kids have already started ...

Aside from sloshing leafy greens in a bowl of clean, cold water, you should avoid soaking any vegetable for a long time. Soaking vegetables can actually reintroduce any contamination, Gavin says.

For the uninitiated, pickling is a preservation process—which can be traced back to 2400 BCE—that involves soaking vegetables in a solution of vinegar, water, salt, and sometimes sugar and spices.