Use by dates

It depends. Long term veggie here.

I know the high risk foods for poisoning like rice and pasta so I'm careful about those. Everything else is fair game as long as it looks and smells OK. I cook mostly from scratch and we don't eat the fake vegan food like "chikun" and "sheeze".

When even the rock salt carries a use by date I think it has all got a bit ridiculous.

I wouldn't have eaten it, my stomach is very sensitive. I don't eat ready meals at all though. My DP would have eaten it with no issues. My Mum could eat anything.

YABU they are a guide not law - if it smells ok eat it. I also regularly re heat rice and never had a problem.

@Mademetoxic yeah I get that . Several people were saying the same. It was your use of the word 'still' that I was querying - it's as if it was something you thought they may have been bothered about in the past but shouldn't be now.

A quick sniff test is enough. If it smells fine and looks fine it is right to eat.

What do you mean by 'still' ? What has changed to make it more or less of a worry? I get that someone struggling for money is less likely to waste food - but I would have thought they would be more on top of dates to ensure they didn't .

It would depend on what the meal was. If it was veggie I would probably eat it, but not if it was fish, and I'd recommend to family members to chuck meat based meals too. I'm normally quite good at checking on dates in the fridge though - and getting things moved to the freezer.

It’s got right degree.

That's ridiculous. Whether your fridge was set to 3 degrees or 4 degrees would have a much bigger effect than those few hours.

🤣🤣🤣 this is so true

Yes to this^
I would throw it away in your case and actually just threw away something which was 12 hours out of date. It’s unfortunate that you forgot about this but I never risk mine, DD’s and DH’s health in these situations. There are examples around when people were very unwell after eating something, I don’t want to be another case. And to be honest even a bout of diarrhea wouldn’t be welcome in our house - we all have commitments and there is only one bathroom.

To keep fresh fruit like strawbs and raspbs from growing hairs and green stuff (lol), decant them into a bowl of cold water, add a couple of teaspoons of white vinegar and swish the fruit around in the mixture. Leave for about 15 minutes. Put in sieve or colander and rinse off the vinegar mix thoroughly. Drain on kitchen paper, then put in clip boxes or similar.

The vinegar keeps the fruit from growing mould. There is no vinegar aftertaste once you rinse the fruit thoroughly.

Ready meals have no bacteria in them (I saw it in a documentary once) so they're probably fine 2 days after. However my husband would have chucked it on the day itself

They are used as a guide and many retailers will put an earlier use by date, for caution. The best thing is to do a smell and judgment of texture. I hate food waste, and trying to reduce how much I throw away, by freezing before use by dates of cannot eat it before it goes off or feed all my friends 😀

Explain to us what science it is then and why they may be variables etc in this science.

No. Clearly I don’t believe in the existence of science whatsoever, simply because when I buy undated oxtail from the butcher I use my eyes and nose to gauge whether it’s fresh and how long it stays that way.

How do you tell whether non-supermarket meat, cheese, fresh produce and farm eggs are safe to eat or not? What’s the scientific method for gauging that?

I'm with your husband, it would have been absolutely fine to eat.

I buy loads of yellow sticker food and I think 80% of the stuff in my fridge must be past it's use by date. With ready meals, I wouldn't think twice about eating one that was four or five days past its date. I wouldn't even bother giving it a sniff or close examination until it got to six days.

eta: I'm a vegetarian though, so I don't know if you have to be more careful if it's got meat or fish in it.

@ComtesseDeSpair so you don't believe in / agree with science then?

No but they err on side of caution and the use by dates aren't that accurate and are arbitrary.

Do the smell test see what it's like and look what it looks like but a few days it should be fine.

It isn’t always, but surely most people follow their eyes and nose when they don’t buy in plastic packaging from the supermarket? My meat from the butcher doesn’t come with a use-by-date, nor do the fresh things from the market. Using common sense and your senses is the norm in a lot of circumstances.

Yes, look at it and smell it, it’s likely to be fine as the supermarkets have to build in a lot of other options like temperature control, storage conditions etc.
If It looked ok, smelt ok, I’d eat it but I might give it an extra few minutes in the oven/ microwave

I run a food shop and we eat most of our out of date stuff. If it hadn't blown I'd still have eaten it

@qquizzys what's the vinegar trick for fresh fruit never heard of this! I also am of the opinion if it smells ok I would eat it. I often keep yogurts and various other things past their use by date, and go by look, taste, smell. The only things I wouldn't take a chance on are fish and chicken.

Give it a sniff, have a taste. Seems okay? Ready to eat.

I work on the assumption that use by dates are likely to be shorter than the actual time food stays safe given some people might routinely ignore them for a while or others may have fridges not set to the optimum temperature. I guess no manufacturer wants negative publicity from their food causing illness, so it makes sense the dates would be on the cautious side. I also smell / check the look of food, and if anything tastes off I bin it. For certain foods more likely to cause food poisoning, I might just throw it away though.

I can confidently say Tesco houmous is safe to eat at least two days beyond its use by date!