Use By/Sell By/Best Before Dates

[bcla]

The most outdated thing in my house now is probably a plastic squeeze container of Swedish mustard from Ikea. I got it as a gag gift Christmas 2016, with a best by date of May 2017. It's still good. There are likely some spices that are a decade old.

Reminds me of the cartoon Futurama and the gag of an auction of one can of "Angry Norwegian" anchovies that was about 1000 years old. The auction house guaranteed that it was edible.

This unopened can of Angry Norwegian-brand anchovies, circa 1997.
Anchovies! The last known can in existence, guaranteed fresh and edible.

​

 

[MrsCobraBubbles]

Do you write on the carton or otherwise keep track of what day you opened the milk?

I used to. Since I'm the only adult in the house, it's pretty easy to keep track of things. I usually just keep a running tally of things in my head. I meal plan, so I can check dates easily against my menu. Now that I'm typing this out, I'm realizing that I should go back to writing dates on things in the fridge because I'm probably exhausting my brain making mental notes about this kind of stuff I'm Mormon, so meal planning and pantry rotation/organization has been trained into my brain for years--I write the expiration dates of every can, jar, and box of pasta that gets put into my pantry real big on the packaging, in black Sharpie. If you pointed at a jar of spaghetti sauce in there I could probably tell you the approximate expiration date without trying to read it. I just have a knack for remembering stupid stuff, I guess.

 

[goofyernmost]

I disagree with that - diet sodas sweetened with aspartame can develop an off taste, as the sweetener loses sweetness (and almost becomes bitter) after a certain amount of time.

Could be, I don't drink diet soda's so I'll take your word for it. However, when and if that does happen I doubt that the "Best by" date was anywhere near that point in time when it became bitter. That is something that we can tell without somebody telling us when to do it.

 

[Skippy918]

Another who uses the sniff appearance test. If it looks or smells bad, it goes into the garbage.

Milk never makes it close to that date as go through 1.5-2 gallons a week, and always look for the furthest out sell by date in the store.

Interestingly, I have volunteered at my local food bank several times with work, and the canned and pre packaged type of foods (ie pasta, sauce, canned goods, mac&cheese, cereals, etc...) all have different use by dates at the food bank. For example, if the expiration date said 7/31/18, there would be a sign based on what type of product it was saying if it was still ok to keep. Often those dates were 1-2 years further out, so something date 1/1/18 would be a keep item.

I have volunteered at our local food bank also. Most things are good well past the expiration dates. Cans are 3 years, tomato based products are 18 months, cereal and other boxed goods was 1 year. The only thing we had to toss post expiration was baby formula.

At home, I typically do the sniff test or if it’s something sitting in the fridge for awhile, I’ll inspect it and if it’s moldy or smelly I will toss it. I have read that heavy cream can go a couple months past the expiration date. I had some old heavy cream in the fridge, but it was still good and didn’t smell bad.

 

[goofyernmost]

After my father-in-law died last summer, DW and I found close to 100 boxes of dried pasta in his house, scattered all over: cabinets, garage, bedroom closet, etc. Some had best by dates of 2011 or so. A few didn't have dates, but some printed manufacture's code that couldn't be deciphered. I told DW that it's still good, but she insisted on throwing out everything past the best by date. Probably around 25 boxes.

He also had about 40 cans of a certain variety of Progresso soup. Something like Creamy Mushroom with Wild Rice. Some of them were a few years out of code too. I agreed with DW that we shouldn't take a chance on those. The ones in code we donated to a food bank, along with plenty of the pasta.

Like others have stated here, smell and appearance is a more valid indicator than any printed dates on the packages.

It is an amazing coincidence that this thread would be running right now. In April of 2011 I moved from Vermont to N.C. I threw out many things that I didn't think I could keep cool enough to make the trip. However, one thing that I did bring was pasta. Just last week I used a box of lasagna noodles that I brought with me 7.5 years ago. I checked them out for any weird stuff growing on it and found nothing. Cooked them up and they were absolutely like brand new stuff. Pasta in particular is packaged as a completely dry product. Unless exposed to something that can live in an environment with no water... they will survive quite nicely.