Food Dates: An Avenue To Be Wasteful?

The popular sausage roll in Nigeria "Gala" is one of the old snack that has been in existence after so many years. Gala has maintained quality since 1962. Gala is said to be one of those quick and available snacks Anyone can hold grabs on. Affordable and everywhere.

With the Lagos traffic jam hawkers are ready on the road to feed the already tired, hungry and cranky passengers and drivers with Gala sausage roll. In fact with the time passengers stay on traffic jam; one could prepare a pot of beans, eat and still the beans would digest while people are still in traffic. That is how serious the Lagos traffic jam is.

But Gala has a way of coming to the rescue and with just a satchet of yoghurt, drinks or water to step down you are good to go.

It has become tradition that when ever you are about to purchase Gala sausage roll or any other, the first thing a consumer does is to look at the wrappers. Well the reason most people might not know. Some times back, my little niece came back with one satchet and the first thing she said was that she checked the wrapper. Then I asked why she did that, she said because that's what everyone does.

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Until I explained to her that people usually look at the dates on the wrapper to know if the sausages rolls are expired or not. But is that necessary? Join me as we find out.

Shelf life

Just like the popular Gala sausage every good product has their "shelf life" and a date that the manufacturers stipulate on either wrappers, jars or any container containing any food product.

Shelf life is the length of time that a commodity may be stored without becoming unfit for use, consumption, or sale.

The shelf life of any product particularly food products in this context determines whether a food is still safe for consumption or should no longer be on sale. However, shelf life depends on the degradation mechanism of a product under the influence of storage factors like the exposure to light, heat, moisture, and micro organisms.

Shelf life is the recommended maximum time for which products or fresh (harvested) produce can be stored, during which the defined quality of a specified proportion of the goods remains acceptable under expected (or specified) conditions of distribution, storage and display.

Expiry dates

An expiration date or expiry date is a previously determined date after which something should no longer be used, either by operation of law or by exceeding the anticipated shelf life for perishable goods.

This simply means that food is said to be expired if it has passed the time of full quality.

Best before
This appears mostly on frozen foods, dried, tinned and other food products. The BB has more to do with food quality than safety. It means that once food has passed it's best before that the food will begin to reduce in qualities like flavour or texture.

The 'best before' date will only be accurate if the food is stored according to the instructions on the label, such as 'store in a cool dry place' or 'keep in the fridge once opened'.

However, if you want to enjoy your food products fresh make sure to pay attention to the "best before" dates. For products like eggs it is better not to exceed this dates as they naturally contain salmonella
which likely would begin to multiply after its 'best before' date. This could cause food poisoning. Store well too and follow every instructions specified.

Use by dates
Frankly, products that have a use by dates should not be eaten once that date has exceeded. This is because the foods can be detrimental to human health once consumed.

Unlike best before dates the use by dates is non negotiable. This foods too are quite prone to spoilage easily and so once they are spoilt can not be advised to consume them for health safety.

When buying your food products kindly make sure that you look out for this date.

Opening date
This date is used to determine how long a product is to be on display for sale. This beneficial to consumers so that they would know exactly if food is of best quality on sale.

Does it mean that dates determine safety and quality of food products?

For the consumer, dates helps to determine when food is of best quality. This in turn helps to eat healthy and prevent health hazards which might come from contaminated foods.

To retailers, dates helps them to be able to know when food is exceeding shelf life so that they can be sold out in good quality. When dates are not known retailers might ignorantly sell out products that might be harmful to health due to over stay in stores. This could be harmful considering that some foods might start breeding micro-organisms which when consumed brings about food poisoning.

How does manufacturers determine dates.

When dating food products, manufacturers put into consideration the length of time and the temperature a food undergoes and is held during distribution and sale.

Another factor that is noted when dating a product is the characteristics of the food product which has to do with ingredients, preservatives and food additives that were added to the food to either improve quality, taste or texture; then the type of packaging which is the type of carrier a food product has for quality and shield from adverse environmental condition .

These factors are what manufacturers use in specifying dates for which food products will be of best quality for consumption.

For example, sausage formulated with certain ingredients used to preserve the quality of the product or fresh beef packaged in a modified atmosphere packaging system that helps ensure that the product will stay fresh for as long as possible. These products will typically maintain product quality for a longer period of time because of how the products are formulated or packaged.
The quality of perishable products may deteriorate after the date passes, however, such products should still be safe if handled properly. Consumers must evaluate the quality of the product prior to its consumption to determine if the product shows signs of spoilage.

Conclusion

The lack of understanding and information on the meaning and reasons for dates on food have lead consumers to discard wholesome foods.

However for food wastage to be reduced consumers must understand that dates applied to foods are for quality and not for safety.

In order to minimize this wastage, some food products are safe to consume past the date on the label, and regardless of the date, as far as containers and cans used in preserving are still intact and in good condition. Hence, Consumers should evaluate the quality of the food product prior to its consumption.

Discard heavily rusted cans. Cans that are heavily rusted can have tiny holes in them, allowing bacteria to enter. If you open the cans and there is any rust inside, do not eat the food. Rust (oxidized iron) is not safe to eat.

We have to understand that storage medium matters a lot. For instance when a can containing foods has punctures this can affect the product inside by giving ways for micro-organisms to penetrate and as a result cause food spoilage even before the date specified. Should we say then that the food was spoilt because it was expired according to date?

This is one of the reason why a food that has not gotten to its expiry date when eaten causes health issues or poisoning because maybe during Distribution something punctured the wrapper, can, glasses break and perishable foods injured.

This does not mean that the date affected the food but lack of proper handling. So we should check properly for this little things and not only dwell on dates. This aforementioned issue can even foster expiration before the date stipulated on the packs.

Except for infant formula and some baby food, product dating — having a "use-by," "sell-by," or "best-if-used-by" date — is not required by Federal regulations. Dating is for quality, not safety. However, if a calendar date is used, it must express both the month and day of the month (and the year, in the case of shelf-stable and frozen products).

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Let us be watchful, we should not be quick to dispose some foods we already have simply because they have exceeded expiry dates, some foods can go a week even after expiration. Share this message around you so that people will get more informed.

Thank you for reading

Reference

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