Eli5 As early stages of mold spreads on food (ex. bread, fruit) would getting rid of the “infected” area make it safe to eat?

Question

Eli5 As early stages of mold spreads on food (ex. bread, fruit) would getting rid of the “infected” area make it safe to eat?

In: 6

Answer 1

Nope!

In general mold somewhere means mold throughout all the watery/soft bits.

Mold spreads all throughout soft foods like bread, juice-containing fruit and vegetables, cooked food, jam, nuts, deli meats, cream and yogurt. Removing the visible part doesn’t remove the mold, and *doesn’t* remove mycotoxins the mold can produce.

However if you have a hard salami, hard cheese, or hard vegetable like uncooked carrot, you *could* in theory remove the moldy bit and mold would probably not have gotten throughout the food.

Mycotoxins can survive cooking, so don’t even think about cooking fully moldy food in hopes to salvage it. At best you’ll get sick, [at worst it can cause cancer or death.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aflatoxin)