Marriott Slaterville, Utah – Christina Entz's refrigerator contains all the usual items: eggs, cheese, fresh fruits and vegetables, milk, and a collection of aged seasonings.
Some items are quite stale, including steak sauce that expired nearly two years ago.
“It looks like we're not using enough steak sauce,” Entz said.
She opened her refrigerator and cupboard to KSL and Palak Gupta, an assistant professor in Utah State University's Department of Nutrition, Dietetics, and Food Sciences.
Our goal was not to criticize Entz who had a stash of expired steak sauce, but to better understand food date labels.
“It's hard to know what to throw away and what not to throw away,” Entz says.
Guidelines, not rules
The variety of date labels creates further confusion. Manufacturers use different terms and can be interpreted in different ways. “Best before date”, “Use by date”, “Purchase date”, “Sell by date”, “Freeze date”, “Packaging condition”, “Fresh by date”, “Best by date”, “Use by date”, etc.
Labels like “use by” make it sound like you need to consume the food by a certain date or you'll get sick, but that's not always the case.
Federal guidelines only require safety labeling for infant formula.
What about other things? Mr. Gupta says it's just a manufacturer's choice.
“This is just an arbitrary guideline for manufacturers to say they think now is the right time for peak quality in their products,” she said.
And that idea is what motivates us to set expiration dates days, if not weeks, in advance when safety is an issue.
“You'd be surprised how much food is thrown away simply because consumers don't yet know it's safe to eat,” says Gupta.
confusion creates waste
A national survey published by Harvard Law School's Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation found that 37% of people always or usually throw away food based on date labels. And in an open letter to the food industry, the FDA highlighted estimates that about 20% of all food waste in the United States is due to date labeling confusion. According to the FDA, the total amount of food thrown away in the garbage is worth tens of billions of dollars.
trust your feelings
So what can you do to avoid throwing away perfectly edible food when misleading date labels don't make safety a priority? The best answer is to trust your senses: sight, taste, and smell. That's it.
“You can definitely do a smell test,” says Gupta. “You can tell if the food is right by smelling it.”
If it has a sour or strange smell, throw it away. Or, if you find mold, strange colors, or perhaps slime, throw it away. Or, if the flavor or texture has diminished, throw it away.
The USDA also has a free FoodKeeper app that tells you how long certain items are likely to spoil in your refrigerator or pantry. Spoiler alert – you can sync your purchases to your calendar.
“About two weeks later, you'll get a notification or a reminder saying, 'Hey, it's in the fridge, go try it,'” said Gupta. “We will also send recall information to your phone daily.”
Also, if food is not handled properly, it can spoil before the date on the label appears. We're talking about food left on the counter too long or left in the car after a shopping trip. Or if it's stored in a refrigerator set to the wrong temperature. Palak says it should be set at 40°F or below.
But the bottom line is, if your sausage pack or yogurt container is a day or even a few days past the date on the label, you probably don't need to chuck it.
But a two-year-old bottle of steak sauce might be pushing it.