He’s obviously one of *those*. The ones that throw out perfectly good food because of an arbitrary number printed on the packaging.
If food has been handled and stored properly, it is often good well beyond the date printed on it. This is especially true for canned goods or prepared items in jars that have been unopened and stored in refrigerators.
I am sure this will get many of the wasteful talking about how insane it is to eat something even one day past the printed date. I say a once-over, a sniff, and if there is any further doubt, an experimental taste will tell you if it’s any good.
P.S. In case anyone is wondering, she is 37 years old.
P.P.S. If she had waited until 2030, she would have scored 41.7 with that can.
I’ll grant a liittle time past the date (especially when it’s a ‘best by’ rather than ‘sell by’, but the example in the cartoon (maybe 5 years) would weigh heavily towards ‘toss’ .
Well, being that she got it out of the refrigerator, the product has most likely been opened. Once opened, ANYTHING should only be kept in the refrigerator for a couple of months.
Yes, there are exceptions, but in general… anything in the refrigerator from last year or longer, should go.
I completely missed the refrigeration element, which puts a whole different light on the question.
P.S. Every time I’m back visiting my dad’s house and open his fridge, I feel like an archeologist.
Yeah — I’m totally comfortable with keeping things in the pantry far past expiration dates — my personal best for that xkcd is 31.1 and counting — it’s dried pasta, so it’s still good unless bugs get to it, and they haven’t. But, also yeah — that’s a refrigerator. That’s different.
Well, then we get people like me who put unopened things in the fridge…
Well, that’s what I get for sleeping late . . . I was going to post that XKCD, too.
The date is 2008. Or maybe even 2003.
I read it totally differently. He looks at the stuff growing in it and says it’s gross and tosses it. Even if the expiration date was 2022, it’s still gross and should still be tossed.
The guy doesn’t seem to look at the product at all, he is just looking at the woman and listening to her words. In his mind, as it is 2019 already it doesn’t matter if the expiration date is 2013 or 2018, he will chuck it out. He doesn’t even seem to know or care what it is.
By the time he tosses it is in the pedal bin whatever it is seems to have grown a lot in size; it is almost the diameter of the bin itself, whereas when the woman first fishes it out of the fridge it is a lot smaller in relation to her body. See especially her hands in relation to the thing in the first and last panels.
It also matters that she’s pregnant. Of course he’s going to be overprotective.
Another take on freshness:
We seem to be complaining about he being the one who throws things out if its past the expiration date, but she’s the one caring about what the expiration date is. Either it’s past the expiration date and bad, or the expiration date doesn’t matter. So what does it matter if it says 2013 or 2018?
If you can’t tell by looking at something whether it was expired last year or six years ago, he’s right. Out it goes.
Am I the only one impressed that it’s the female who evidently thinks old stuff is a safe bet and the male who decrees it dead? I find myself recalling Oscar’s refrigerator in “The Odd Couple”, which housed such antiquities as milk standing without a bottle.
MA, this couple often displays relationship roles (and other social roles) that seem kind of countercultural. Or another way of looking at it, the woman is the protagonist of the comic, and her attitudes and reactions are often the central point.
After my mother passed away a few years ago I went through the pantry to find countless unopened boxes of cake mix, most well over a decade old.
I haven’t mustered up the courage to try one.
Are old “mint-in-box” cake mixes collectible? :-)
I tend to use things – food and other – past their dates if it is a short time – longer for some things.
When our refrigerator started going late last month we ordered a new one – came 2 days later. (I had to work the day in between and God forbid Robert deal with something by himself plus he might have killed the delivery guys who came as he gets so angry at stupidity.) We have a small freezer in the basement from when we used to grow vegetables and had to freeze for the winter, so the fridge freezer had been emptied into same. We then started going through the old fridge so they could take it away. We came down to 4 things which actually had to be refrigerated – open package of American cheese, 6 eggs, open package of cream cheese (from Passover -,this year – when I can’t eat peanut butter) and a box with 2 insulin pens for Robert. Everything else was there for convenience – soda, filled by us bottles of water, iced tea individual bottles, condiments (not mayo), peanut butter, James Bond beer and the like. ( I actually figured out that if we use the basement freezer then other than Thanksgiving when the turkey would be a problem, we could probably get by with a dorm size refrigerator.) When they called that they were on their way we took these last 4 items out of the fridge and put them in a couple of lunch cold bags with frozen plastic ice to keep them until the new fridge.
Fridge cannot be used for the first 24 hours. This fridge had external damage not noticed until the crew left and then found out it varies too much in temperature. Called next morning – as they called us back – and they could exchange for a new one – but not for a week – okay, what could we do. We had a choice of 3 models – 1 too tall for space, 1 had only 3 cold settings, and this model. We left the fridge running for soda and such, but worried about the insulin going too cold and the food too warm. We had to charge the batteries to our RV and were going to be away most of the week in same, so we plugged it in to charge the batteries and turned on the fridge in it. The needed items fit in the tiny fridge – but I figured I won’t use the cream cheese anyway – and tossed it – 3 items needed to be kept cold.
i started thinking – well, the insulin pens are good out of the fridge for 42 days. There are 2 left in fridge and 1 started – that would be 39 days as he uses 1 about every 13 days and the first one is also about half used at least. They went into something called a FRIO which uses water evaporation to keep them cold – not fridge cold, but well under the 86F maximum temperature so we know they are safe. That left 2 items to keep cold.
As we left on our trip we found out that the aging batteries in our RV when charged at (with a converter) at 20 amps instead of 30 amps cannot recharge the batteries and run the fridge – so batteries not recharged and fridge in same not usable on a good part of trip as batteries not charged enough to run it.
When we got home – delivery to be the next day – we had to figure it out again. Decided the eggs leftover from Passover could go. That left a started package of American cheese. It stayed in the house fridge until they came with new fridge – a day late and 2 hours after the window they said they would come on the day late – what do we do it? Well stores don’t always put them in their fridge – so I may die next time I eat a slice of American cheese as it was out for over 24 hours.
Lots of stuff that did not actually have to be in the fridge tossed due to date. Cans of Coca Cola up maybe 6 years ago where tossed, especially when one of them started leaking on the kitchen counter. Old mustard – out. Old jelly – out. So, now I have a fridge filled mostly with plastic bottles filled with water as the fridge had to be kept at least half filled to function properly and we don’t even have enough stuff to fill 1/8 of it. I guess we have to go shopping one day soon for more than one dinner.
Oh, and tomorrow we are going to shelp down to the middle of New Jersey to have new batteries put in the RV that we had to have the place order in advance for us.
I know from experience that some cake mixes lose their leavening when too old.
@ Brian – I’ve run into a few German mixes that didn’t have enough leavening in them even when they were brand new. The solution (both for them and their ancient American counterparts) is simple: whisk a couple teaspoons of baking powder into the mix before combining in anything else.
P.S. @ Andréa – If you were asleep, how in the world did you know that XKCD needed to be posted? ;-)
“P.S. @ Andréa – If you were asleep, how in the world did you know that XKCD needed to be posted? 😉”
What I meant was, soon as I saw the email about the expiration date comic, I thought, ‘XKCD did that!’ Then, smartly enough, I read the other comments and saw that you’d posted it already. If I’d been online at my usual time, I’d probably have posted it before you. Or not.
As predicted, the Date Observant preach adherence to the holy printed date.
An expiry date on medicine is one thing. You don’t want to risk a loss of efficacy and I would encourage people to adhere to those. Food tends to be a different matter. As always, visual inspection and a sniff test are advised.
Just because something has been opened or is refrigerated, doesn’t mean it must be tossed on that magical date. Some items should last a very long time in the refrigerator. I’ve had good success with ham and bacon in sealed packages, I found a package of ham in the fridge that was about three months past the printed date. It looked fine and smelled fine and cooked up with no problem. Other refrigerated items I’ve safely consumed many time well after expiry date:
-pickles: this includes dill pickles and olives in brine.
-milk: Milk is quite variable. In some cases, I’ve found it just fine a couple of weeks after the date. Other times, it’s gone bad before the date
-cheese: Real cheese (not those fake slices) can keep a very long time if I take the cheese and place it in a zip lock bag after opening the package. If I don’t do this and just keep it in the package and improperly sealed, I find it tends to pick up mold fairly quickly.
-eggs: refrigerating eggs is not a universal practice. I’ve found eggs seem to last almost indefinitely when refrigerated. However, I only use eggs as ingredients, I do not eat them on their own, so can’t say for sure.
-yogurt: It’s milk gone bad, so as long as you keep it refrigerated and don’t contaminate it, you’re good.
-sour cream: as with yogurt
-condiments: these last for ages
-mayonnaise: opened it can keep many, many months past the due date. Just keep it cold and don’t contaminate it.
I’ve found the most important thing is to keep the items uncontaminated. I make sure I use a clean spoon or knife every time and never put the utensil back into the container after it has been in contact with other food. I never eat out of a yogurt container, always spoon it into a dish. I spoon out mayo with a clean spoon, then spread it on my sandwich with a knife. If I want more, I use the spoon again, thereby not putting crumbs into the mayo. If I want a pickle from the jar, I always use a fork to get it out, never pull it out with fingers.
As for canned food, I’ve consumed canned beans and canned soup years after the date on the tin. I used to stock up on a dozen tins at a time when they were on sale back when money was tight. Wound up with quite a stockpile. I’ll admit that flavour , colour, and texture were sometimes below newer tins, but all were quite serviceable.
Oh, and let’s not forget the magic of freezing. Lots of stuff can be frozen, thereby ensuring it will last and last. Bread tends to freeze well. So do bags of milk.
Singapore I’ll,
Eggs in other places are often processed differently, and keep just fine without refrigeration. If you want to keep eggs almost indefinitely, oil them before refrigerating them. Anything that keeps the air out.
F@#$&k autocorrect!! Sorry, Bill
“An expiry date on medicine is one thing. You don’t want to risk a loss of efficacy and I would encourage people to adhere to those.”
I have XANAX from 1999 I still use. As I only take `1/4-1/2 ‘as needed’, I obviously haven’t needed it much, but it still works.
Most things have a “Best By” date rather than expiration. Even my milk has that. The whipping cream says “Use Thru Sept 02 2019”. Not sure I can stretch it that long.
Comics I Don't Understand 
He’s obviously one of *those*. The ones that throw out perfectly good food because of an arbitrary number printed on the packaging.
If food has been handled and stored properly, it is often good well beyond the date printed on it. This is especially true for canned goods or prepared items in jars that have been unopened and stored in refrigerators.
I am sure this will get many of the wasteful talking about how insane it is to eat something even one day past the printed date. I say a once-over, a sniff, and if there is any further doubt, an experimental taste will tell you if it’s any good.
This strip fits perfectly with Monday’s XKCD:
P.S. In case anyone is wondering, she is 37 years old.
P.P.S. If she had waited until 2030, she would have scored 41.7 with that can.
I’ll grant a liittle time past the date (especially when it’s a ‘best by’ rather than ‘sell by’, but the example in the cartoon (maybe 5 years) would weigh heavily towards ‘toss’ .
Well, being that she got it out of the refrigerator, the product has most likely been opened. Once opened, ANYTHING should only be kept in the refrigerator for a couple of months.
Yes, there are exceptions, but in general… anything in the refrigerator from last year or longer, should go.
I completely missed the refrigeration element, which puts a whole different light on the question.
P.S. Every time I’m back visiting my dad’s house and open his fridge, I feel like an archeologist.
Yeah — I’m totally comfortable with keeping things in the pantry far past expiration dates — my personal best for that xkcd is 31.1 and counting — it’s dried pasta, so it’s still good unless bugs get to it, and they haven’t. But, also yeah — that’s a refrigerator. That’s different.
Well, then we get people like me who put unopened things in the fridge…
Well, that’s what I get for sleeping late . . . I was going to post that XKCD, too.
The date is 2008. Or maybe even 2003.
I read it totally differently. He looks at the stuff growing in it and says it’s gross and tosses it. Even if the expiration date was 2022, it’s still gross and should still be tossed.
The guy doesn’t seem to look at the product at all, he is just looking at the woman and listening to her words. In his mind, as it is 2019 already it doesn’t matter if the expiration date is 2013 or 2018, he will chuck it out. He doesn’t even seem to know or care what it is.
By the time he tosses it is in the pedal bin whatever it is seems to have grown a lot in size; it is almost the diameter of the bin itself, whereas when the woman first fishes it out of the fridge it is a lot smaller in relation to her body. See especially her hands in relation to the thing in the first and last panels.
It also matters that she’s pregnant. Of course he’s going to be overprotective.
Another take on freshness:
We seem to be complaining about he being the one who throws things out if its past the expiration date, but she’s the one caring about what the expiration date is. Either it’s past the expiration date and bad, or the expiration date doesn’t matter. So what does it matter if it says 2013 or 2018?
If you can’t tell by looking at something whether it was expired last year or six years ago, he’s right. Out it goes.
Am I the only one impressed that it’s the female who evidently thinks old stuff is a safe bet and the male who decrees it dead? I find myself recalling Oscar’s refrigerator in “The Odd Couple”, which housed such antiquities as milk standing without a bottle.
MA, this couple often displays relationship roles (and other social roles) that seem kind of countercultural. Or another way of looking at it, the woman is the protagonist of the comic, and her attitudes and reactions are often the central point.
After my mother passed away a few years ago I went through the pantry to find countless unopened boxes of cake mix, most well over a decade old.
I haven’t mustered up the courage to try one.
Are old “mint-in-box” cake mixes collectible? :-)
I tend to use things – food and other – past their dates if it is a short time – longer for some things.
When our refrigerator started going late last month we ordered a new one – came 2 days later. (I had to work the day in between and God forbid Robert deal with something by himself plus he might have killed the delivery guys who came as he gets so angry at stupidity.) We have a small freezer in the basement from when we used to grow vegetables and had to freeze for the winter, so the fridge freezer had been emptied into same. We then started going through the old fridge so they could take it away. We came down to 4 things which actually had to be refrigerated – open package of American cheese, 6 eggs, open package of cream cheese (from Passover -,this year – when I can’t eat peanut butter) and a box with 2 insulin pens for Robert. Everything else was there for convenience – soda, filled by us bottles of water, iced tea individual bottles, condiments (not mayo), peanut butter, James Bond beer and the like. ( I actually figured out that if we use the basement freezer then other than Thanksgiving when the turkey would be a problem, we could probably get by with a dorm size refrigerator.) When they called that they were on their way we took these last 4 items out of the fridge and put them in a couple of lunch cold bags with frozen plastic ice to keep them until the new fridge.
Fridge cannot be used for the first 24 hours. This fridge had external damage not noticed until the crew left and then found out it varies too much in temperature. Called next morning – as they called us back – and they could exchange for a new one – but not for a week – okay, what could we do. We had a choice of 3 models – 1 too tall for space, 1 had only 3 cold settings, and this model. We left the fridge running for soda and such, but worried about the insulin going too cold and the food too warm. We had to charge the batteries to our RV and were going to be away most of the week in same, so we plugged it in to charge the batteries and turned on the fridge in it. The needed items fit in the tiny fridge – but I figured I won’t use the cream cheese anyway – and tossed it – 3 items needed to be kept cold.
i started thinking – well, the insulin pens are good out of the fridge for 42 days. There are 2 left in fridge and 1 started – that would be 39 days as he uses 1 about every 13 days and the first one is also about half used at least. They went into something called a FRIO which uses water evaporation to keep them cold – not fridge cold, but well under the 86F maximum temperature so we know they are safe. That left 2 items to keep cold.
As we left on our trip we found out that the aging batteries in our RV when charged at (with a converter) at 20 amps instead of 30 amps cannot recharge the batteries and run the fridge – so batteries not recharged and fridge in same not usable on a good part of trip as batteries not charged enough to run it.
When we got home – delivery to be the next day – we had to figure it out again. Decided the eggs leftover from Passover could go. That left a started package of American cheese. It stayed in the house fridge until they came with new fridge – a day late and 2 hours after the window they said they would come on the day late – what do we do it? Well stores don’t always put them in their fridge – so I may die next time I eat a slice of American cheese as it was out for over 24 hours.
Lots of stuff that did not actually have to be in the fridge tossed due to date. Cans of Coca Cola up maybe 6 years ago where tossed, especially when one of them started leaking on the kitchen counter. Old mustard – out. Old jelly – out. So, now I have a fridge filled mostly with plastic bottles filled with water as the fridge had to be kept at least half filled to function properly and we don’t even have enough stuff to fill 1/8 of it. I guess we have to go shopping one day soon for more than one dinner.
Oh, and tomorrow we are going to shelp down to the middle of New Jersey to have new batteries put in the RV that we had to have the place order in advance for us.
I know from experience that some cake mixes lose their leavening when too old.
@ Brian – I’ve run into a few German mixes that didn’t have enough leavening in them even when they were brand new. The solution (both for them and their ancient American counterparts) is simple: whisk a couple teaspoons of baking powder into the mix before combining in anything else.
P.S. @ Andréa – If you were asleep, how in the world did you know that XKCD needed to be posted? ;-)
“P.S. @ Andréa – If you were asleep, how in the world did you know that XKCD needed to be posted? 😉”
What I meant was, soon as I saw the email about the expiration date comic, I thought, ‘XKCD did that!’ Then, smartly enough, I read the other comments and saw that you’d posted it already. If I’d been online at my usual time, I’d probably have posted it before you. Or not.
As predicted, the Date Observant preach adherence to the holy printed date.
An expiry date on medicine is one thing. You don’t want to risk a loss of efficacy and I would encourage people to adhere to those. Food tends to be a different matter. As always, visual inspection and a sniff test are advised.
Just because something has been opened or is refrigerated, doesn’t mean it must be tossed on that magical date. Some items should last a very long time in the refrigerator. I’ve had good success with ham and bacon in sealed packages, I found a package of ham in the fridge that was about three months past the printed date. It looked fine and smelled fine and cooked up with no problem. Other refrigerated items I’ve safely consumed many time well after expiry date:
-pickles: this includes dill pickles and olives in brine.
-milk: Milk is quite variable. In some cases, I’ve found it just fine a couple of weeks after the date. Other times, it’s gone bad before the date
-cheese: Real cheese (not those fake slices) can keep a very long time if I take the cheese and place it in a zip lock bag after opening the package. If I don’t do this and just keep it in the package and improperly sealed, I find it tends to pick up mold fairly quickly.
-eggs: refrigerating eggs is not a universal practice. I’ve found eggs seem to last almost indefinitely when refrigerated. However, I only use eggs as ingredients, I do not eat them on their own, so can’t say for sure.
-yogurt: It’s milk gone bad, so as long as you keep it refrigerated and don’t contaminate it, you’re good.
-sour cream: as with yogurt
-condiments: these last for ages
-mayonnaise: opened it can keep many, many months past the due date. Just keep it cold and don’t contaminate it.
I’ve found the most important thing is to keep the items uncontaminated. I make sure I use a clean spoon or knife every time and never put the utensil back into the container after it has been in contact with other food. I never eat out of a yogurt container, always spoon it into a dish. I spoon out mayo with a clean spoon, then spread it on my sandwich with a knife. If I want more, I use the spoon again, thereby not putting crumbs into the mayo. If I want a pickle from the jar, I always use a fork to get it out, never pull it out with fingers.
As for canned food, I’ve consumed canned beans and canned soup years after the date on the tin. I used to stock up on a dozen tins at a time when they were on sale back when money was tight. Wound up with quite a stockpile. I’ll admit that flavour , colour, and texture were sometimes below newer tins, but all were quite serviceable.
Oh, and let’s not forget the magic of freezing. Lots of stuff can be frozen, thereby ensuring it will last and last. Bread tends to freeze well. So do bags of milk.
Singapore I’ll,
Eggs in other places are often processed differently, and keep just fine without refrigeration. If you want to keep eggs almost indefinitely, oil them before refrigerating them. Anything that keeps the air out.
F@#$&k autocorrect!! Sorry, Bill
“An expiry date on medicine is one thing. You don’t want to risk a loss of efficacy and I would encourage people to adhere to those.”
I have XANAX from 1999 I still use. As I only take `1/4-1/2 ‘as needed’, I obviously haven’t needed it much, but it still works.
Expiration dates explained:
https://www.netfunny.com/rhf/jokes/07/Aug/dates.html
Most things have a “Best By” date rather than expiration. Even my milk has that. The whipping cream says “Use Thru Sept 02 2019”. Not sure I can stretch it that long.