Expiry dates on food

Caporegime
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Lol at some of these comments, I freeze milk and cheese (softer varieties mainly) fairly often, with no issue on defrosting.


How long does mulk take to defeost?

As a single guy who drinks/uses it in fits and starts and shops being miles away milk is an awkward one I try to have a few uht ones in the cupboard but its not the same
 
Soldato
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So Tesco and probably the rest of the big 4 let you keep stuff for free if you kick up a fuss? Hah. No wonder they are so expensive compared to the German supermarkets and other discount stores. You're still paying for it really.
 
Caporegime
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How long does mulk take to defeost?

As a single guy who drinks/uses it in fits and starts and shops being miles away milk is an awkward one I try to have a few uht ones in the cupboard but its not the same

I don't really pay that much attention, I tend to get a litre out of the freezer when there is a 3rd left of the current one in the fridge. Milk keeps ok when not opened anyway.

Maybe it would be best for you to freeze a bunch of the smaller bottles, as they would defrost quicker.
 
Caporegime
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I don't really pay that much attention, I tend to get a litre out of the freezer when there is a 3rd left of the current one in the fridge. Milk keeps ok when not opened anyway.

Maybe it would be best for you to freeze a bunch of the smaller bottles, as they would defrost quicker.

Tbh id probaby stick it in bags, cravendale is good as it lasts like 3 weeks unopened.
 
Soldato
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So Tesco and probably the rest of the big 4 let you keep stuff for free if you kick up a fuss? Hah. No wonder they are so expensive compared to the German supermarkets and other discount stores. You're still paying for it really.

Yes.

Although in my case aldi have no product for me, is no home delivery service.

Also I am not sure with tesco if you even supposed to need to kick up a fuss, a few times I have had managers show up doing the deliveries, and they go out their way to do the "refund and get to keep" without me uttering a word. About 2/3 of the drivers do the same. The majority of the rest will do it if you just give a small hint like "hmm this receipt is showing some low dated food", and the reply is like "let me refund that for you".
 
Associate
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We always use things after the expiry date - they're usually pretty conservative and if stuff hasn't grown legs or started to smell it's usually fine. For things that we've opened (like tubs of greek yogurt), if I'm not sure I use stilltasty.com which gives you an idea of how long stuff lasts after expiry dates/after opening. It also tells you what foods you can freeze. It says milk can last up to a week after the expiry date if kept cold and yes it freezes fine.
 
Man of Honour
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So Tesco and probably the rest of the big 4 let you keep stuff for free if you kick up a fuss? Hah. No wonder they are so expensive compared to the German supermarkets and other discount stores. You're still paying for it really.

I have no idea if Tesco do that, as my wife discontinued online shopping with them due to too many unwanted substitutions.
However, when I was “doing the Knowledge” years ago, to gain my London Black Cab licence, I’d do a couple of days per week on an HGV driver agency, to supplement my income.
One of the jobs that I did often, was taking Tesco produce to stores in Suffolk and Norfolk in a 40’ refrigerated trailer.
During a delivery in Thetford, Norfolk one day, a guy hauled a pallet truck from the store to the loading dock, and threw a lot of food into a skip, one of the items was a box of four iced cakes.
I reached over and took the box from the skip, it had a sell by date on it, which was that day.
I said to the warehouse foreman, “I’ll have these, save throwing them away”, he said “If you take them, we’ll call the police.”
I said, “You’re kidding, surely?”
He said, “No, Tesco are terrified that if we gave the stuff away, and someone got sick after eating it, they’d be sued.”
 
Soldato
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wiltshire
depends, if its past the use by and sealed and smells ok, then I would normally go for it, had chicken today that was two days past the use by (pre cooked) but it was sealed and smelt fine. Yes you cant always smell if something is off but it's pretty wasteful to throw things away because you are maybe 12/24 hours over a date they have to play it safe by anyway.
 
Soldato
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or dont say stupid stuff, rather than trying get out of it. a container has a very small air gap at he top and tha air gap wil contain 99% of water from the milk, and our talking about an absolutely tiny amount which makes zero diference.
most milk is absolutely fine to freeze, not only is it very low fat as its had the cream skimmed off, is also homogenised meaing it normally doesnt seprate either.

Milk is around 80%+ water if you freeze it, the molecules break up the fat content so its bloody terrible when defrosted.

Its just chemistry, the more water content in a produce the more it breaks down fat and protein when frozen.

That's why fresh veg has more protein content than frozen veg.
 
Soldato
Joined
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6,260
Location
Deep North
I have no idea if Tesco do that, as my wife discontinued online shopping with them due to too many unwanted substitutions.
However, when I was “doing the Knowledge” years ago, to gain my London Black Cab licence, I’d do a couple of days per week on an HGV driver agency, to supplement my income.
One of the jobs that I did often, was taking Tesco produce to stores in Suffolk and Norfolk in a 40’ refrigerated trailer.
During a delivery in Thetford, Norfolk one day, a guy hauled a pallet truck from the store to the loading dock, and threw a lot of food into a skip, one of the items was a box of four iced cakes.
I reached over and took the box from the skip, it had a sell by date on it, which was that day.
I said to the warehouse foreman, “I’ll have these, save throwing them away”, he said “If you take them, we’ll call the police.”
I said, “You’re kidding, surely?”
He said, “No, Tesco are terrified that if we gave the stuff away, and someone got sick after eating it, they’d be sued.”

Usually if it's that days date then they are just reduced until sold unless it was already late on at night or they had a staff shortage meaning no one on the department later on to clear though the reductions.

Also the taking the cakes out of the waste is still considered theft. When I worked in retail this was all that was ever talked about when damaged/out of date food was binned, nothing about being terrified about being sued, that's just to sell newspapers.
 
Caporegime
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Milk is around 80%+ water if you freeze it, the molecules break up the fat content so its bloody terrible when defrosted.

Its just chemistry, the more water content in a produce the more it breaks down fat and protein when frozen.

that isn't the claim you made before... when you thought the air content made a significant difference or that the water content increased somehow...

but yes, the consistency changes, the water content doesn't magically increase
 
Man of Honour
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Milk is around 80%+ water if you freeze it, the molecules break up the fat content so its bloody terrible when defrosted.

Its just chemistry, the more water content in a produce the more it breaks down fat and protein when frozen.

That's why fresh veg has more protein content than frozen veg.
yes it is chemistry, but you have the chemistry wrong. Even in whole milk its around 87% water, and no just freezing milk does not always mean the fat is split out of suspension.
So you are still very wrong. also the taste is opinion, as showen many people are perfectly happy freezing milk.
 
Soldato
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7,728
How long does mulk take to defeost?

As a single guy who drinks/uses it in fits and starts and shops being miles away milk is an awkward one I try to have a few uht ones in the cupboard but its not the same

2 litre bottle? About a day or two longer if kept in the fridge. I don't bother unless its a public holiday and the supermarkets are closed for days.

Milk is around 80%+ water if you freeze it, the molecules break up the fat content so its bloody terrible when defrosted.

Its just chemistry, the more water content in a produce the more it breaks down fat and protein when frozen.

That's why fresh veg has more protein content than frozen veg.

Semi skimmed and skimmed is fine, full fat is not recommended apparently I havn't tried it though.
 
Soldato
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that isn't the claim you made before... when you thought the air content made a significant difference or that the water content increased somehow...

but yes, the consistency changes, the water content doesn't magically increase

Freezing anything will increase water content, it could be air in the container or the structure of the frozen produce.

You cannot freeze lettuce and cabbage for example as it screws it up. When frozen it brakes the molecular structure up.
 
Soldato
Joined
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4,908
yes it is chemistry, but you have the chemistry wrong. Even in whole milk its around 87% water, and no just freezing milk does not always mean the fat is split out of suspension.
So you are still very wrong. also the taste is opinion, as showen many people are perfectly happy freezing milk.

Suspension of a liquid still happens in milk as its solute in the fat of the milk, but as we know oil and water don't mix, hence the comment about it smashing protein and structure up.
 
Man of Honour
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Ottakring, Vienna.
Freezing anything will increase water content, it could be air in the container or the structure of the frozen produce.

You cannot freeze lettuce and cabbage for example as it screws it up. When frozen it brakes the molecular structure up.
I'm really not sure that's correct. The structure of the frozen produce increasing the water content? How does that work?
 
Caporegime
Joined
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58,898
Freezing anything will increase water content, it could be air in the container or the structure of the frozen produce.

You cannot freeze lettuce and cabbage for example as it screws it up. When frozen it brakes the molecular structure up.

How? You freeze a sealed container of milk and then defrost it... how has the water content increased?

It changes consistency, the fat clumps together etc... you're not increasing the water content and the air in the container has nothing to do with this.
 
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