Roseville Columnist Finds Oldies Not Always Goodies

So have you read any good labels lately?

And have you paid attention to the fine print on food packaging where it states the "sell-by" or "best if used by" dates?

My son gets apoplectic if a food item is still in the cupboard or refrigerator even seconds beyond those dates. I made a beautiful salad for his birthday dinner and after I had tossed it with the remnants of a bottle of Vidalia onion dressing I found in the 'fridge, he noted the date on the label was past prime. He wouldn't even touch the salad, which tasted fine to me. 

"It was vinegar in it. It's not going to kill you," I said, soothing the other guests while he made a fuss.

At my northern lake house over Labor Day weekend, he tossed out a perfectly good jar of salsa that had exceeded its marked date. I resisted the temptation to sneak it back into the refrigerator, but I knew he'd scout it out.

Many years ago when I was food writer at the Pioneer Press, a gent called to ask if he could eat oatmeal that had little bugs in it.

"No," I said. "Toss it."

His comeback: "You've probably never been really hungry."

Some think those use-by or sell-by dates are a food manufacturer's method to force product off shelves so they can keep replacing it with new. Clearly, some foods are more durable than others as long as the containers are inviolate. The sniff test will tell you if a salad dressing has gone rancid. Use common sense.

But I did learn recently that packaged cake mixes don't last forever. I needed to make a quick batch of cupcakes and I used a mix that was well beyond its date, trying to avoid a dash to the store. The cupcakes were the opposite of light and airy, and I not only had to toss them, but I still had to make that store trip, plus use up more eggs, oil and oven heat. Lesson learned.

I just called a friend to chat, and her husband answered the phone, telling me that he was holding a can of Mexicano Nacho Cheese Sauce dated July 23, 1992. They were doing a major pantry clean-out, and the record for oldest food item they'd found was 1987, the year before they moved into their house.

"All our garbage cans are full," he said of their purge. "We even had to haul some old stuff to a shopping center dumpster."

Great idea for a column, I thought, and that brought to mind the spice drawer at my lake cabin. I recently found a little tin container there, with a 29 cents price tag on the bottom. Must have come from my mother's kitchen, and she died in 1980. Who knows when she bought it, but the price indicates probably in the 1950s.

There's an old food joke about the couple who celebrated their 25th anniversary by buying a new jar of nutmeg.

According to spice manufacturers, seasonings should be replaced every six months to a year. Who's going to incur that expense? Just use a little bit more if the flavor has somewhat faded. But if the price tag says 29 cents, I guess it's time to give it a toss.