OH keeps food past it’s sell by and I want to kill him

[BellaFreckle1]

Ok so this is a really random subject but I need to know if anyone else is in the same boat as me ...

My OH is a nightmare for keeping food past it’s sell by date and claims it’s only a guideline. It’s starting to really upset me because imo he’s risking food poisoning and sickness. He also leaves cooked food on the kitchen worktop overnight and uncovered then freezes or refrigerates it the next day. I made Mac and cheese a couple nights ago and left the remains in the oven dish on the worktop and asked him to refrigerate it for the following days lunch. I got up in the morning to find it still sitting on the counter so I asked him to throw it in the bin and when I got home from work I found it in the freezer!!!

I know this is probably so trivial but it’s really upsetting me and I’m concerned that one of us is going to become really ill.

I accidentally threw out cheese that was within the sell by date and he almost started crying - honestly his eyes glazed over and he was so mad.

Any advice would be great - I need to nip this on the bud before one of us ends up sick!!

I love these threads. The competition of who has eaten the oldest, mouldiest food item and lived to tell the tale. 😂

DH used to work for a food research association, and they did lots of shelf life tests. The only consistent thing about them was that there was no consistency in the results - under exactly the same conditions, items would go off at completely different rates. Which is why the manufacturers put a lot of leeway in their ‘best before’ & ‘sell-by’ dates, because they don’t want to be held responsible.

I’m actually quite shocked at some of the posts on here. The food waste is appalling. Obviously you need to be careful with fish and meat, and be sensible about refrigerating leftovers, but throwing away a loaf of bread a day past it’s best before date? Fruit and vegetables? That’s what my mother would have called “wicked waste”

Exactly. Bread and fruit and veg goes mouldy so you can see it’s off. Milk stinks so you can smell it. Ditto eggs. Meat is risky because you might not be able to see or taste if it’s off.

YABU OP, not that I think you will be back since you didn't get the replies you wanted. I often leave things overnight if they are too warm to go into the fridge and never had a problem. The DM story is completely different as the food was left out for five days. We didn't have a fridge when I was a child in the 1940s/50s and as another PP said, milk was kept in a bucket of cold water and other food kept in the pantry. We all survived.

There's far too much food wasted in this country and it's because people only go by the use by date and not their eyes and nose.

At school I was always taught that smell wasn't a reliable method of judging if food was off as some bacteria can get to unsafe levels before you'd smell it.

People need to learn the difference between Spoilage Bacteria and Pathogens which can cause Foodborne illnesses!

Spoilage Bacteria will make the food smell/taste/look off (mould, slimy, smelly etc) and won't make you sick.

Pathogens which cause Foodborne illnesses won't always be obvious if food is contaminated, hence why people get sick from foods they thought were perfectly ok to eat. These Pathogens can be dangerous and cause S&D.

Using your eyes/nose to detect contaminated food will only work usually with Spoilage Bacteria so common sense doesn't always come in to it.

So people saying they just use their common sense on whether something looks and smells ok is fine, but that's only if the food has Spoilage bacteria, which even if you did eat, won't give you S&D.

Ok, I haven't RTFT yet (still on pg7), but I'm hoping by the time I'm done there will be more info about rice. I had no idea about the dangers of rice.

My biggest questions is how is rice cooked, cooled and then used in sushi and yet still safe, and how long is sushi safe for?
Can you stick rice into the fridge immediately after cooking to prevent the bacteria? I know you shouldn't put cooked meat immed into the fridge, is that the same for rice?
Sorry for all the questions!

Rice is one of the biggest foods in my diet as I have many food problems. We also have several compromised immune systems in our house, so I want to be very careful. Thanks!

My biggest questions is how is rice cooked, cooled and then used in sushi and yet still safe

It's acidified (with vinegar), to the point that bacteria are substantially inhibited. See, for example:

www.gov.mb.ca/health/publichealth/environmentalhealth/protection/docs/sushi.pdf

B. Preparation of acidified rice
• Rice must be cooked before acidification. The rice must be cooled rapidly to 5°C (41°F) from the time it has been taken out of the rice cooker and logged for review.
• Proper preparation of acidified rice is important to ensure the rice is safe to use. Rice acidified to a pH of less than 4.6 will inhibit the growth of pathogenic bacteria. Acidification of rice should occur as soon as possible after cooking.
• The pH of the rice is to be checked to ensure proper acidification has occurred. Refer to Appendix A for pH measuring devices. Once acidified, the rice must be stored covered when not being used.
• Acidified rice can be stored up to 8 hours and at the end of the day, the remaining rice must be discarded.

The biggest problem with rice is the cooking process doesn't kill the spores which contain bacteria. So once cooked, if you want to keep it you need to cook it quickly and refrigerator it. If leave it out and let it get to room temperature, as the rice cools down through the danger zone of 5-63 degrees, the spores open and the bacteria multiplied.

You have to cook rice to 122 degrees to kill the spores which obviously we don't do in our own kitchens.

Cool it quickly not cook

I once ate some bad rice and my body rejected it almost immediately, I started being sick within 10 minutes and didn't stop until I was just bringing up bile then I was fine.
I was a bit clueless, just a youngster and it had been sitting out in a warm kitchen for 3 days.

Wow! Thank you ReflectentMonatomism and CiderBrains! So no making sushi at home anymore

At last a sensible voice on here @CiderBrains

I work in the food industry. It's amazing how many people say things like "we didn't have all these safety regulations back in the day," when talking about some basic hygiene practices.

These "hygiene practices " are what EHO check on and base your score on. If we didn't follow these practices (to minimise the risk of giving the customer food poisoning) then we would be given a 0 or a 1 score.

The same people who question all these "rules and regulations " then go on to say they only eat at places who have a score of 4 or 5.. 🙄

I feel a bit safer on rice cooked in an electric pressure cooker which I believe reaches temperatures which can kill spores. I still try to cool leftover rice as quickly as possible (cool pan in water immediately, box up in a shallow layer and get into fridge within 30 mins)