Use by/sell by dates - will we die?

If in doubt, cook it thoroughly. I sometimes leave a saucepan of soup on the side for 24 hours as I cannot get the saucepan in the fridge. I put it on the stove the next day, bring it to the boil and leave it to boil for 5 minutes. Any bacteria are unlikely to survive.

I would not do this with any soup with a meat base, especially chicken or other poultry.

Ohhhh dear have you written your will
My aunty couldn't see very well in her latter years and she would eat bread with green crusts she went on to 94
I think we re all way to precious about these things how did we manage before all these numbers arrived on our food

Just about to put a ready meal in oven yesterday's date!

They found tinned food in the Antarctic left by Scott and his men which was apparently still edible.

But of course, probably preserved by the cold as well.

The huge safety margins on foods cause huge amounts to be wasted. Many young people throw out anything past it's use-by date.
We oldies were brought up to never waste food and have more sense than to bin perfectly edible items. We probably shop more carefully too, not buying too much or items we won't use.
My vet said tablets last for years and when my mother worked at Boots she was told that you can safely double or treble the dose of over-the-counter medicines.
Our risk-averse culture has robbed people of common sense.

So long as it's not bubbling Jalima.

It's fine, if it had dried out I would have been a bit hesitant about using it because it would have meant the seal had gone.
But the 'bubble' thing on the lid was still firmly depressed and it went 'pop' when I opened it.

Total marketing ploy.

If it looks okay, smells okay and tastes okay- its fine!

My rule is:

If it smells OK, tastes OK and hasn't gone a funny colour then it's probably OK. Any doubt and I don't take the risk.

What about my 2014 chutney?

Still smells and tastes good!

What about the fruit and veg I grow, the preserves I make and the home-made ready meals in the freezer? None of them have use by dates.

Does that mean they will be safe forever

Re flour, Christine, I lived for quite a while in the Middle East, where the flour nearly always had weevils in it.
I would just put the whole bag in the freezer for a couple of days, and then get rid of all 'foreign bodies' via a fine sieve.

My MIL who worked for \Hovis in the 50`s said that flour which is more than three weeks from production has flour mites . It didn`t bother her , she still used it as she said the cooking process killed them !

Good point Christine. We get pantry moths in the summer and they go for dry goods including dried fruit. I try to keep them in containers, but I've had to throw out a few things because you could see the webby things and sometimes tiny maggots - yuk!
Our supermarket has a section for out of date goods and it's very popular.

Flour is a tricky one as it can have mites in it. Always wise to check it if it's been in the cupboard for a while.

I always crack eggs into a saucer before doing anything else with them.
Even if they're not the freshest, if they smell OK then to me they're fine.

I use my nose, and rarely have to throw anything out. It really grieves me to have to throw anything out, so I make a lot of what my mother used to call 'dustbin' soups - mostly fresh veg, pearl barley, etc., but also including that one dried up rasher of bacon or bit of ham, leftover mash or boiled spuds, any limp old carrot or bit of celery, a few sprouts or a leek that are past their best but OK once you've peeled the top layer off.
With fresh meat, your nose will soon tell you if it's gone off.

When clearing the flat of dh's old aunt after she died, we found several tins of veg and soup, etc. - some of them years out of date.
But since the tins were all perfectly sound I took them home and we used them all.
We're still here!

I do try to keep on top of the dates but sometimes things slip through especially cupboard items like spices, flour etc. The worst thing for us was on two occasions DH ate an only slightly gone out of date Activia yogurt and had the most violent stomach ache. We have since noticed that even the in date ones give him stomach ache though.

My DC always look at the sell/use by dates in my cupboards and fridge and gently harangue me for leaving 'old' stuff in there. They find it hard to understand that having such dates is relatively new and we've all survived so far - even they have because I never bothered when they were children! Perhaps it's a way of getting us to buy more, but it's an awful waste. That said I admit to being nervous about fresh meat - just in case!

shysal I rely on the sniff test even for things within sell by dates.Opened some bacon last year only just bought, and it didn't smell right, so went back to store.

Anya

It's the preservatives in the food which keep us going
That's DH's theory anyway

Re eggs - put them in a pan of water (in their shells) and if they float they are off.

I made a birthday cake for DGD yesterday using eggs with a December date! I also scrambled some for my breakfast this morning. I did break each one into a separate cup first to sniff them, and they were fine. I never keep them in the fridge. I am careful with cooked meats etc, but within a few days I rely on the sniff test. As for vegetables, I don't even read the dates. Any old wrinkly ones go into soup. I suppose that means that I would make a good soup too!

Glad to hear from you todaykitty

i think it's OK for us to eat these out of date foods because we're all Past-Our-Sell-By-Date too

I was watching a cookery program the other day and they were talking about sell by dates on eggs, and they were saying that its safe to eat eggs well passed the dates on the box! they also advised not to keep eggs in the fridge. Before dates arrived on foods we used our nose and if food smelt funny we threw it away!