lostonearth35 wrote:
I mentioned a few times on WP about my problems with this phobia. Yesterday I was reading about how it's wasteful to throw away food that's only a day or two past its use by date, and I told my mom I'd rather waste it than risk food poisoning, because NOTHING is worth getting food poisoning. And then my mom went into a rant about how when she was a kid there were no use by dates on anything, you only threw food out if it smelled bad, and the food companies want you to waste it just so you'll spend more money. But she couldn't understand why it says on milk cartons that it's good for 2-3 weeks, because when she was young you replaced milk every three days or so.
Me, too. If it's been in my fridge (and opened) for 7 days, it's out of here.
Sell-by dates, on the other hand, can sometimes be inaccurate. If it's closed up, you can typically do the sniff test. Humans are really good at sniffing out blatant rot, but not so much pathogenic contamination.