The Amusing Cucumber: Debunking "The Amazing Cucumber" Chain E-mail

Cucumbers... WOW!!! WHAT LITTLE GEMS!

Wow! So begins a chain e-mail about cucumbers. You know the type. The general type of chain e-mail, that is, not to imply that there's been a rash of cucumber chain e-mails. I got it forwarded to me the other day by my mom (who forwarded it for its humor value, not because she thought it was actually useful, for the record). Predictably, the e-mail, typically sent with the subject line "The Amazing Cucumber," cites tons of outrageous "facts" and myriad miracle uses for cucumbers for things as wide-ranging as personal health and household repairs. To read the e-mail, you'd think that every woman ought to carry a cucumber with her in her purse (insert your own joke here).

I wasn't particularly taken from the get-go, but as is my tradition I headed over to Snopes.com for the lowdown. If you're not familiar with Snopes I suggest you educate yourself. It's your one-stop shop for all the bunk removal you'll ever need. Urban legends, rumors, and those pesky chain e-mails disproved (and on rare occasions proven partially right), usually complete with fun facts to back up the conclusion.

Except in this case. Snopes has an entry for the cucumber e-mail, but as of right now it's incomplete. It's listed as "research in progress," which I've honestly never seen before, especially given that Snopes is usually on the ball and the e-mail was first spotted in December 2009.

Well, it's been over two years and they're still slackin'. So I decided to do my own cucumber research and see what I can find out. I did some research and even some experiments, which I have cheesily video documented in order to present solid evidence that I own an iPhone. But before we go over the e-mail's "facts" point by point, let's learn some real information about cucumbers.

• Cucumbers are technically a fruit. This makes them the lamest, blandest fruit in the world, since they're already pretty lame and bland even by vegetable standards.
• Cucumbers come in "slicing," "pickling," and "burpless" varieties. "Burpless" is hilarious all by itself, but it's even funnier when you realize that it's actually a polite way of saying they won't make you fart.
• Cucumbers originated in India and have been cultivated for 3,000 years. Still awake?
• Cucumbers vary in size, sweetness, and thickness of skin. Dosakai is a round, yellow cucumber found in India, which is about as creative as cucumbers get.
• The term "wild cucumber" refers to a plant that is also called "manroot," which is related to cucumbers but in a different genus. If someone offers to show you their "wild cucumber" or "manroot" it is a good idea to walk away quickly.
• Cucumbers smell like the musk of a copperhead snake, or maybe vice versa. The Smithsonian Institution backs up the claim, so any rumors that this is only an urban legend may therefore be an urban...legend?
• I'm a cucumber:

Thank you, Brak. Now let's move on to the "meat" of the e-mail itself.

1. Did you know cucumbers contain most of the vitamins you need? Just one cucumber contains Vitamin B1, Vitamin B2, Vitamin B3, Vitamin B5, Vitamin B6, folic acid, Vitamin C, calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium and zinc.

Ok, this one's easy. To the right you'll see some pertinent nutrition facts for a single medium cucumber. We'll refer back to it later. There will be a quiz.

As you can see, the basic claim that a cucumber contains all of the above mentioned nutrients is true. However, you would need to eat fifty whole cucumbers, or over thirty pounds' worth, peel and all, just to get your daily allotment in of most of those boasted nutrients. If you're that ambitious you might want to go for the "burpless" kind. Myself, I can barely choke down the two or three inch-thick cucumber slices that restaurants always serve on their salads to drop the not-so-subtle hint that the guy who cuts up the salad ingredients is a sociopath.

2. Feeling tired in the afternoon? Put down the caffeinated soda and pick up a cucumber. Cucumbers are a good source of B vitamins and carbohydrates that can provide that quick pick-me-up that can last for hours.

Refer to the above. A cucumber may be more natural and better tasting than your average energy drink, but it's hardly going to give you wings. I've had Zipfizz, which is probably the most awesome energy drink in existence. It contains 41,667% of your daily B12 (You would have to eat infinity cucumbers to match that!) and anywhere from 50-125% of several other B vitamins. Still, on a typical Thursday it brings me from "comatose" to "marginal." I have a feeling a cuke would bring me from "comatose" to "comatose, farting, and done with cucumbers for at least a week."

3. Tired of your bathroom mirror fogging up after a shower? Try rubbing a cucumber slice along the mirror, it will eliminate the fog and provide a soothing, spa-like fragrance.

This marks the first hub I've written that I've actually invested money in. 98 cents on two cucumbers, to be precise, and as you'll soon see I rendered one of them completely inedible and got assorted yuck on several portions of the other one. For this first experiment I also wasted some hot water to fog up my mother-in-law's bathroom mirror.

As the video shows, a cucumber does a halfway decent job of momentarily removing mirror condensation. I would rate it similarly to pretty much any object that can either absorb water or spread it around. It doesn't leave as much crap behind as toilet paper, which is my usual resort, but...spa-like fragrance? Just a smell that might make you hungry if you actually like cucumbers. Or fearful if you have ophidiophobia.

4. Are grubs and slugs ruining your planting beds? Place a few slices in a small pie tin and your garden will be free of pests all season long. The chemicals in the cucumber react with the aluminum to give off a scent undetectable to humans but drive garden pests crazy and make them flee the area.

This one is just plain silly. First and foremost, how can you even tell if a slug is fleeing? I don't even think slugs move in the normal sense. I mean, obviously they get from place to place, but I think it only happens when you're not looking like the hedge animals in The Shining (not the Stanley Kubrick version). This is why I can leave the kitchen for five minutes, come back, and find a slug that is actually larger than some cucumbers on the kitchen counter, at least ten feet away from any exterior door or wall or even any potential hiding place. But I can then glare at it vindictively for half an hour, trying to think of the least disgusting way of extracting it, and it will not move an inch. I'm almost certain it can feel the hate radiating off of me in waves. It can clearly see the salt shaker mere feet away. If a slug can feel terror it surely must in that moment, so I can only assume that it's trying, in its own capacity, to flee. But nothing happens.

Second, a little internet research suggests that slugs eat cucumbers. In fact, I found a comment here from someone who took this very e-mail at its word. The cuke/foil combo actually attracted slugs. So efficiently, in fact, that the commenter started referring to them as "slug baits."

And let's talk about this magical aluminum "reaction." It's a little-known fact that aluminum is actually a fairly active metal and oxidizes rapidly. The reason why it doesn't crumble away in a matter of hours is because it quickly forms an inert outer layer of aluminum oxide, which is what rubies and sapphires are made out of. It would have to be this layer that the cucumber reacts with, and if it did then as far as my research shows it would quickly expose the metallic aluminum beneath, which would then oxidize, and basically it would eventually eat a hole in the aluminum. Mercury can amalgamate with aluminum and cause rapid "rusting," but even then it has to penetrate through a fresh scratch in the aluminum because it can't do anything to the oxide layer by itself. This Popular Science article explains more of the science behind it, and the video on the right shows the amalgamation reaction in action.

So if cucumbers react with aluminum does that mean they contain mercury? Don't know if that's a point in favor of cucumbers.

5. Looking for a fast and easy way to reduce the look of cellulite before going to the pool? Try rubbing a slice or two of cucumbers along your problem area for a few minutes, the phytochemicals in the cucumber cause the collagen in your skin to tighten, firming up the outer layer and reducing the visibility of cellulite. Works great on wrinkles, too.

There may be a little bit of veracity to this. Cucumber juice does have anti-inflammatory properties, which is why some women put it on their faces (I think). As for collagen and cellulite and whatnot, I can't easily find a link that isn't either a repost of the e-mail or something worded very similarly, which means either the e-mail has been popularly accepted as truth or there is some actual truth to it. Time for some field research!

My wife reluctantly agreed to rub some cucumber on an area that she (not me, of course) thought needed a little work. Yes, I actually got my wife to rub cucumber on herself. That's what we call journalistic integrity. As the video shows (by which I mean "as she tells in the video," because for some reason she refused to let me film the procedure), the only noticeable effect was some redness and irritation. What the video doesn't show is that a few minutes after I stopped filming my wife reported that the area had developed a full-blown rash. Is there such a thing as a cucumber allergy? There's hardly even anything in cucumbers. But I guess red bumps might help conceal other skin problems, so I'll rate this one a partial success.

Regardless of how well the trick works, however, you still have three small problems if you smear cucumber on your thighs:

1. You just smeared cucumber on your thighs.
2. You now smell like a copperhead.
3. Slugs may now "flee" toward you.

6. Want to avoid a hangover or terrible headache? Eat a few cucumber slices before going to bed and wake up refreshed and headache free. Cucumbers contain enough sugar, B vitamins and electrolytes to replenish essential nutrients the body lost, keeping everything in equilibrium, avoiding both a hangover and headache.

This is only true if you lost 5% of your daily value of B vitamins. Most search engine results for this fact result in reposts of the e-mail, and I don't have enough good mornings as it is without risking them on hangover experiments. Also, I can barely keep cucumber down when I'm completely sober unless dill and brine are involved. I can't imagine trying to eat it drunk.

7. Looking to fight off that afternoon or evening snacking binge? Cucumbers were often used by European trappers, traders and explorers for quick meals to stave off starvation.

Meals? Meals? Now a cucumber is a Powerbar? Look back up at those nutrition facts. An entire cucumber has 45 calories, so we're back up to almost 45 cucumbers to keep you going on a 2,000 calorie diet. I guess the low caloric density of the fruit might help curb cravings for a little while, but warding off starvation? You'll need 200 pounds of cukes for a week on the trail. Hope you have a roomy backpack. And some Gas-X.

8. Have an important meeting or job interview and you realize that you don't have enough time to polish your shoes? Rub a freshly cut cucumber over the shoe, its chemicals will provide a quick and durable shine that not only looks great but also repels water.

If you just happen to have a cucumber on your person you're probably trying to impress someone other than a prospective employer, but I gave this one a go with a pair of older shoes, just in case the cucumber juice ate through them like it can apparently eat through aluminum and human flesh. The results were unimpressive.

If you try this trick make sure you wipe the seeds off your shoes when you're done and hope the interviewer isn't afraid of snakes. And if the cucumber sheen still isn't enough you can add the finishing touches with some slug mucus.

9. Out of WD40 and need to fix a squeaky hinge? Take a cucumber slice and rub it along the problematic hinge, and voila, the squeak is gone!

This is why I always carry a cucumber in my tool box. No, really, that's why.

I don't think you have to have to a be a genius to realize ahead of time that cukes aren't going to do the job. They contain a negligible amount of fat, so you're pretty much limited to water for your lubricant. Still, I decimated a cucumber slice in a video experiment. And voila, the cucumber slice is gone! But the squeak remains.

10. Stressed out and don't have time for a massage, facial or visit to the spa? Cut up an entire cucumber and place it in a pot ofboiling^[sic] water. The chemicals and nutrients from the cucumber will react with the boiling water and be released in the steam, creating a soothing, relaxing aroma that has been shown to reduce stress in new mothers and college students during final exams.

As my mom pointed out when she forwarded the e-mail to me: Why are new mothers taking final exams? Still, I cut up some cucumber, tossed it in a pot, and cranked the heat.

The result was a pot of mushy cucumber that smelled like a cross between squash and fart. I tested the concoction on my wife, who is a relatively new mother as the video clearly shows (don't worry, our daughter was just ticked off that we ignored her for thirty seconds to shoot a silly cucumber video), and my sister-in-law, a college student.

It's possible that I screwed this trick up, because I now see that it says to add the cucumber to a pot of already boiling water. But somehow I doubt it, and no way am I blowing another 49 cents and doing that crap all over again. I'm using the Myth Busters version of the scientific method here, people. If one trial is good enough for them it's good enough for me.

11. Just finished a business lunch and realize you don't have gum or mints? Take a slice of cucumber and press it to the roof of your mouth for 30 seconds to eliminate bad breath. The phytochemicals will kill the bacteria in your mouth responsible for causing bad breath.

What better way to impress a client than to save a cucumber slice from your salad and suck on it while you're waiting for the check?

Well, nothing ventured nothing gained. So I stuck a cucumber slice in my mouth, waited a bit, and huffed into my wife's face (I love you, honey!). I wish I had just kept my camera running the whole time, because I made a pretty hilarious involuntary gagging noise while I had the cucumber slice in my mouth, and now you'll just have to imagine it.

Surprisingly, however, the result was tolerable breath. So I'm going to call this one a moderate success.

12. Looking for a 'green' way to clean your faucets, sinks or stainless steel? Take a slice of cucumber and rub it on the surface you want to clean, not only will it remove years of tarnish and bring back the shine, but is won't leave streaks and won't harm your fingers or fingernails while you clean.

I do wonder about something that can supposedly clean tarnish off a faucet, cure your cellulite, and repel (or maybe attract) slugs, and yet you can still eat it. Still, nothing ventured nothing gained, so I rubbed some cucumber all over a grubby sink.

Surprisingly, it did look somewhat better after I was through, and it might have even removed some tarnish, assuming that my keen male eye can actually differentiate tarnish from dirt, which I'm not sure if it can. Still, a relatively shiny sink from a cucumber slice. I'll be darned. The results were inconclusive for the toilet bowl, however.

13. Using a pen and made a mistake? Take the outside of the cucumber and slowly use it to erase the pen writing, also works great on crayons and markers that the kids have used to decorate the walls.

Problem is, most colleges forbid the use of cucumbers during essay tests.

The video speaks for itself here. Attempting to erase pen with a cucumber results in wet paper and most of the pen marks you started with. I suppose that since I have a toddler I have ample opportunity to test the wall crayon theory, but I don't want to teach my daughter that it's okay to rub fruit all over the wall. I think she's learning enough weird stuff from my hub research already. Plus I'd have to figure out how to get the cucumber slime off the walls, and something tells me this e-mail won't help me.

So what have we learned today? Quite frankly I have no idea. I think we might have learned that you shouldn't believe everything you read, but if you didn't already know that you probably couldn't be seeing this article because you pawned your computer for Nigerian scam money.

We've also learned, I think, that there actually are a few cucumber things mentioned in this e-mail that sort of work. Unfortunately, this does not mean they are convenient, or that you wouldn't look like an idiot while doing them. But the next time you're eating a cucumber, you might want to stop and think. What about? I don't know that either. In my case it would be something along the lines of, "Why the hell am I eating a cucumber plain? Has my life really come to this?"

But for now, all of this science has left me with a hefty appetite. I'ma go have a pickle spear. Now those things are amazing.