Shelf Life

Some people are methodical.  They will check out everything in the pantry or the refrigerator at recurring intervals to determine the expiration dates on packaged food items, and then proceed to discard those that are past due.  This practice would no doubt be religiously followed in well-organized households.

However, many people, I am inclined to think, are like me.  They simply don't inventory their food stocks on a regular basis, and long-expired items may be left in the secret recesses of the kitchen cupboard or the fridge way past their imprinted expiration dates.  Now, of course we may, I think with some assurance, regard a jar of marmelade with a 'best before' date of September 2005 as still edible, and possibly even palatable, in September 2006.  Well and good.  But not all foods are created equal.

For breakfast this morning, I discovered that we were out of oatmeal.  In the back of the pantry shelf was a box of crispy rice flakes.  Without a second thought, I poured some into a bowl, added low-fat milk, and the first spoonful told me that all was not well with the flakes.  So then I took a look at the box top, and there I found the printed date of November 2005.  Ten months past the due date, those crispy rice flakes showed a distinct lack of freshness, a hint of over-the-hill-ness in texture as well as taste. So there is something to be said for taking note of the expiration date on the package.

Tomorrow I will go through the contents of our pantry and throw out the passé items within.  And the day after it will be the refrigerator's turn.

I wonder when it was that I made that left-over egg salad in the small Pyrex dish in the back of the bottom shelf? And why is it that color?