To feed my family this?

[loopyluna]

Just discovered that the beef in my fridge was best before yesterday. If I make a stew then put it in a tub in the fridge, do you reckon it'll be ok to feed the family tomorrow evening? The beef looked and smelled fine to me...

Cook and freeze possibly? You body tells you if something is off I think.

Eating it tomorrow will be fine, you don't need to disrupt your pizza night to eat it tonight.

When you cook food the existing bugs get killed, and then you have a certain amount of time before a new set of bugs grow. So, it'll be good for the same amount of time after cooking regardless of whether you cooked it as soon as you bought it, or waited a while. Cooking it kind of re-sets the timer, iyswim.

(this is different from putting it in the freezer - which doesn't kill the bugs, just slows them down. That's why you should freeze stuff as soon as you buy it - or as soon as it's cooled after cooking)

I don't eat meat anyway, but I think you need to be extra-careful with meat, eggs, dairy and bagged salad, so I always stick to the 'use by' dates with these. I often eat bread or vegetables and fruit that are days past their 'best before' dates. In fact, a loaf of wholemeal bread sometimes lasts DS and I for the whole week. Neither of us seem to be able to taste if it's stale!

eggs are one of things you need to least mind the dates on, they last for months after the stupidly early dates stamped on them. And you can tell an off egg a mile away, there is zero chance of accidentally eating a bad one.
And bagged salad has so many chemicals sprayed on it nothing could get you, but if there is something there its there with ro regard for the dates on it.

There seems to be unfounded paranoia about perfectly fine foods.

Pre washed salads are one of the worst for listeria.

Eggs are easy you do the float test or crack them
Open

My dad is a butcher and if it's only 1 or 2 days it's fine - as long as it smells okay.

Vacuum packed meat is even more okay.

With meat, your nost really is the best way to test.

Once it's cooked, meat can keep in the fridge before reheating/eating cold for 4 days (except fish which is 2 days).

Yoghurts are so sterile when packed that they are one of the safeest foods you eat over the BB/use by date.

If it looks and smells OK (not greyish or smelling gamey) then yes, I'd cook it today and eat it tomorrow. If you make stew it'll get a thorough cooking which will kill any bugs, so it will be fine tomorrow or even the day after. (I'd be a bit less sanguine - if you'll forgive the pun - about roasting it rare to eat tomorrow though.)

I don't agree with the 'use it today' crew.

I will keep anything in the fridge up to 5 days after it's cooked - no problem - and so can generally avoid throwing anything away.

Of course it is ok. Sell/by use by dates are daftt. Sometimes thinks are off before that date and you wouldn't dream of using them but more often things are ok way, way after the date. Double cream is a point in question. It seems to go on for ever but when it goes off there is no doubt.

cook it today, let it chill, and then slice it for sandwiches tomorrow, it will be absolutely fine, and once cooked it will keep for a few more days.. the deli counter in supermarkets do not throw their cooked meats away on a daily basis do they?

Working in the food industry I would diligently ignore any best before/display until dates etc.

Use By however I would always always stick to, the products are rigorously Bacti tested in factories to set those dates to when the bacteria load becomes high enough on average to cause illness. Meat from a butcher has different processes and packaging .

You cannot smell or taste bacteria, it is not a reliable form of testing. For example cooked rice is the biggest culprit of food poisoning and you would never be able to tell.

So no personally I wouldn't with meat or dairy or rice. Anything else is fair game

I ate a yoghurt that was a week out of date yesterday . It smelled fine, it tasted fine, I'm still alive...

Really shocked that cooked rice and bagged salad are such risky things, it would never occur to me that those things would bear any risk at all!

Cooked rice is deadly. Yoghurt can't go off because by definition it is already off. Tis gone off milk, yum!

see, I keep hearing this about rice but I have reheated rice mixed in with leftover thai curry loads of times. OP, yes use the meat and what the hell does washing it do?? never heard that before!

If it smells fine then I would go for it, but you probably have already made the decision by now

I was told by my butcher that the best way of beef NOT going bad was to take it out of the plastic and if your wrap it wrap it in paper.

Rice is my one dodgy point in any food related issue, after a huge discussion about projectile vomiting due to the bacteria............grim.

Beef is usually fine a few days later.

It's chicken that is the problem. Even sometimes a couple of days before best before date.

I keep rice all the time with no problems. It is important to keep it as free from contamination as possible and heat it well.

The dates on eggs are for leaving outside the fridge (as they are in the supermarket). In the fridge they last longer anyway.

If it's "best before" then it's just a suggestion. "use by" means you should eat it by then.

I generally ignore both, unless it's fish because I hate the stuff as I know it can be a bit iffy.

Enjoy your pie

No no no

You shouldn't keep eggs in the fridge anyway

The meat should be fine for a few days yet, but YABU to try to make a stew out of mince - beef chunks only.

Super fine. There have been loads of threads on MN last couple of days about this!

Once meat has been cooked, the BBD becomes irrelevant anyway. By that I mean that you can disregard the fact that the BBD is today, yesterday, tomorrow. Once it's cooked, treat as you would if the meat had been a week away BBD.

we pay a premium for aged beef, ffs!! (28 days minimum, kept in cold store. i.e. A FRIDGE) Most supermarket beef has been aged for less than 14 days.