Topic: 'Best Before' Dates

I'm sitting having a cup of coffee and have just poured some single cream into it. The 'Use By' date on the lid says 30 Dec 10. It smells and tastes fine so I've put it back in the fridge to be used again.

Years ago, a neighbour gave me some tins of beer and lager from his garage. They were 18 months out of date and I drank every one. I must admit that I poured them into a glass first and 'inspected' them.

Some foodstuffs seem to 'go off' before the 'Use By' date whilst others (my cream for instance) seem to go on and on.

I wonder how these dates are decided. We never used to have them.

Does anyone just throw good stuff out because of the date on it or do you decide for yourself?

Bob

i am not bothered about use by dates.

i eat it when i eat it, sometimes 2-3 years past its date.

but would never tell anyone else to do that, its just personal choice.

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i eat it when i eat it, sometimes 2-3 years past its date.

That might turn-out to be a record Leonard. Well......you're still with us in any case. ;)

Bob

cheers bobby.

all the best bargains can be bought at the out of date shop !!

QUOTE:

That might turn-out to be a record Leonard. Well......you're still with us in any case. ;)

Bob

I've got some 1 Million year old Rock Salt with a use by date of March 2012.

How did they work that out a million year ago?

QUOTE:

cheers bobby.

all the best bargains can be bought at the out of date shop !!

Or retrieved FREE from the skip at the back of the supermarket as Jonathan Maitland did in a recent TV documentary.

Bob

QUOTE:

I've got some 1 Million year old Rock Salt with a use by date of March 2012.

How did they work that out a million year ago?

Nice one Wilba..........bonkers isn't it?

Bob

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Does anyone just throw good stuff out because of the date on it or do you decide for yourself?

My good lady will not throw anything out unless it has gone off. She spent most of her summers in Romania with her grandparents and they never wasted anything.
Whereas I will not take any risks at all and especially when it comes to milk. I have this phobia which is probably born from my school days when we used to get a small bottle of milk every morning. It would be sat outside all weather so if it was winter it would be solid ice and in the summer warm and creamy (and smelly ). To this day I still cannot drink milk on its own.

I believe for 'Use By' dates, a lab tests maybe thirty samples of similar fresh meat and when half have started to develop 'dangerous' bacteria they set the use by date maybe a day earlier - to give a safety margin. In reality some meat could 'turn' earlier and some 'later'.

I think the 'best before' dates are just to protect the makers form law-suits and being sued for alleged food-poisoning.

Have you noticed that today the labels on things like 'Ketchup' say store in a fridge and consume within six weeks!

If it looks and smells ok then I usually use it, I remember them introducing the new labelling, before that we used common sense. I work on the theory that the shops are being cautious and the is a bit of lee way on the sell by date.
Incidentally, I also hated that warm school milk that we had to drink... Yuk!..Carol