ABSTRACT: Adequate hardness is essential property of cookware to avoid leaching of particles into food due to corrosion and/or abrasion. Aluminum metal is noted to have health questions and comparatively lower hardness than most other common food grade metals whilst chloride media are capable of corroding it and deteriorating its hardness. The paper stemmed from a desire to understand the extents to which some commonly prepared and served Nigerian foods at NDA cadets canteen (mess) namely; Amala, Moimoin, Ogbono (Irvingia gabonensis) soup, sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas), and boiled beef amidst different possible chloride environmental exposure condition can cause corrosion and affect hardness and food safety level of aluminum cookware as used at the mess. Hardness coupons were produced with unused cookware gotten from the mess and procedurally prepared and soaked for 30 days in separate media that were prepared by sequentially homogenizing each menu with 0-1200ppm of NaCl to accelerate any chloride corrosivity of the menus and their exposure environments to various levels. After the soaking exposure, the coupons were removed and tested of their Vickers micro-hardness values. Analysis of the collated test results indicated negligible hardness deterioration of the utensils by the coupons hardness reductions of 0.000667 to 0.023% with the NaCl additions to the test media. X-ray fluorescence analysis of Ogbonno soup test medium which caused comparatively highest hardness reduction of 0.023% indicated undetected aluminum ion content that can be negligibly much less than 0.03% by weight in the medium with negligible chance of any health risk to the soup consumers according to health-safe daily aluminum ion intake requirement of 10mg/kg and lower by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authority of USA.
Key words: Keywords: Corrosion, Aluminum cookware, Health risks, Food chloride, Hardness integrity
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