Scientific American, 27 March 2025

How Microplastics Get into Our Food

Kitchen items—sponges, blenders, kettles—are abundant sources of microplastics that we all consume.

When Amy Lusher moved in with her partner, one of the first things she did was get rid of all the plastic kitchenware in their household and replace it with items made of glass, wood and stainless steel. As a senior researcher in microplastics at the Norwegian Institute for Water Research, Lusher was acutely aware of how all the chopping, whisking, scraping and heating we do when preparing meals may release tiny particles of plastic into the food we eat. “It’s coming from our cooking. It’s coming from our packaging. It’s in most of our bottles,” she says.

By now scientists like Lusher have found microplastics coming off dishwashing sponges, blenders, kettles—you name it. According to one 2024 study, plastic cookware may contribute thousands of microplastic particles each year to homemade food. Old plastic kitchenware was the worst culprit, and the researchers also concluded that microplastic shedding may be exacerbated by heating cookware or using hard or sharp utensils on it.