Confirmed Food Life - Personal Experience In Long Term Storage

The only negative experience I've had with any canned goods are with tomato sauce. They all have a date of 2008 and 2009. About half have stained labels
indicating that the contents have made it through the liner.
 
Starkist tuna in water, expired 01/2012. Opened and eaten yesterday. Tasted fine. I'll admit I had reservations, but it was delicious.

The only negative experience I've had with any canned goods are with tomato sauce. They all have a date of 2008 and 2009. About half have stained labels
indicating that the contents have made it through the liner.

I've had condensed milk seep through a dented can, and a couple cranberry sauce cans go bad.
 
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ANTIBIOTICS IN THE FREEZER - 3 years beyond expiration date!

Dentists are wonderful. If you have bad teeth like I do and need an occasional root canal, they issue you antibiotics before they do surgery. Sometimes, your dentist does it and then the root-canal specialist does it also. This means you have extras! I have kept several regiments of these 'extra' antibiotics in the freezer in a freezer Ziploc.

Two weeks ago, I have the start of a tooth ache in my jaw - about a 2 out of 10 on the pain scale. I can't get to the dentist due to my travel schedule. When the pain later on hits 5-7 out of ten, I take a regiment out of the freezer that is THREE YEARS BEYOND IT'S EXPIRATION DATE and take it. In 24 hours, pain is down to a 2 again, and by the time I finish a week later, pain is about a 1. It works like it was supposed to. Today it's down to about 0.1 on the 10 scale of pain.

Then, I go to the specialist yesterday and he prescribes me some more antibiotics!

The new prescription is in the freezer, replacing the one I used. And, the tooth gets fixed on Monday.

The freezer is our friend for extending medicine life!
 
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Don't forget that pet store antibiotics are exactly the same stuff. Here on NES is someone who's wife is a pharmacist and she said at the factory the same bottles go down 2 different labeling lines. Same stuff.
I keep intending to buy a few and put them in the freezer for SHTF.
 
Dentists are wonderful. If you have bad teeth like I do and need an occasional root canal, they issue you antibiotics before they do surgery. Sometimes, your dentist does it and then the root-canal specialist does it also. This means you have extras! I have kept several regiments of these 'extra' antibiotics in the freezer in a freezer Ziploc.

Two weeks ago, I have the start of a tooth ache in my jaw - about a 2 out of 10 on the pain scale. I can't get to the dentist due to my travel schedule. When the pain later on hits 5-7 out of ten, I take a regiment out of the freezer that is THREE YEARS BEYOND IT'S EXPIRATION DATE and take it. In 24 hours, pain is down to a 2 again, and by the time I finish a week later, pain is about a 1. It works like it was supposed to. Today it's down to about 0.1 on the 10 scale of pain.

Then, I go to the specialist yesterday and he prescribes me some more antibiotics!

The new prescription is in the freezer, replacing the one I used. And, the tooth gets fixed on Monday.

The freezer is our friend for extending medicine life!

Nice bit of info, thanks.
Another option is fish anti-biotics; but do your research.
 
Lots of pet antibiotics available in capsule form. Pretty much any type you want. You don't need to freeze them. There's a bunch of gov and mil studies out there about normal shelf life being beyond 25 years.
 
Be careful with expired medication, especially antibiotics

I believe they turn toxic after a while

I'm still standing. The freezer kept the antibiotics like new. If they didn't work or I got worse within 24 hours, I would have sought medical help.

And, apparently there are no facts to back up your assertion:

Safety and Toxicity. Contrary to common belief, there is little scientific evidence that expired drugs are toxic. There are virtually no reports of toxicity from degradation products of outdated drugs.

According to The Medical Letter (2015) the only report of human toxicity that may have been caused by chemical or physical degradation of a pharmaceutical product is renal tubular damage that was associated with use of degraded tetracycline (GW Frimpter et al, JAMA 1963; 184:111). Since then, tetracycline products have been changed to eliminate the problem [2]. The lack of other reports of toxicity from expired medication is reassuring, however expired medication toxicity is not a well-researched field.

See here.
 
I'm still standing. The freezer kept the antibiotics like new. If they didn't work or I got worse within 24 hours, I would have sought medical help.

And, apparently there are no facts to back up your assertion:



See here.

Interesting. I was told that by my doctor years ago, so I took it as fact. I hang onto hard to get stuff like pain killers for a couple years just in case, but I always tossed that antibiotics.
 
Don't forget that pet store antibiotics are exactly the same stuff. Here on NES is someone who's wife is a pharmacist and she said at the factory the same bottles go down 2 different labeling lines. Same stuff.
I keep intending to buy a few and put them in the freezer for SHTF.

I can attest to them working with no ill effects. I had a bad sinus infection last winter. With no insurance and no real disposable income, I bought tetracycline in the powder form from a pet store. I followed a twice a day regiment. After the fourth day I felt better but continued to take it. I will say the powdered form tasted like crap even with mixing it with water flavoring. The tetracycline was $15 compared to a walk in clinic price of $175 plus the cost of the antibiotics they prescribed. You do the math.
 
Fish Mox and the like are must haves period. Even with insurance you're going to save a ridiculous amount of money.

There is no shortage of official documentation on dosage and which AB to choose with a quick Google search. Also I would highly recommend having a PDR (Physicians Desk Reference) on hand.
 
Diced tomatoes definitely start to get can tasting. The high acidity makes that inevitable. Sooner or later they'll actually eat thru the can, so make sure you're checking for any black/marred visual indications, especially around the seals. I usually dump all acid stuff in a bowl and inspect can before I add it to a recipe.

Trust your nose before tasting. When you taste something, place it on your tongue and wait before chewing. Your body is very good at identifying when something is off if you listen to it. Remember we're not fighting zombies right now, so throwing an item out even on a hunch is a good idea.
 
All i have to add is that ramen can actually go bad... couple weeks ago i had an instant lunch cup that was like 3 yrs old and although it was edible and i didnt get sick, it tasted off and the way it came out the other end was strange, ill leave it at that. Xtry is right about trusting your gut/nose/tongue.
 
All i have to add is that ramen can actually go bad... couple weeks ago i had an instant lunch cup that was like 3 yrs old and although it was edible and i didnt get sick, it tasted off and the way it came out the other end was strange, ill leave it at that. Xtry is right about trusting your gut/nose/tongue.

How did you have it stored?

My son recently had a Ramen packet from 2010 (code on the back read: 051110 JV 11:43) and didn't complain.

We keep them in a medium size Tupperware container without an O2 absorber.
 
Hmm.. I'll have to pull out a box I have stashed and check one out. I just have one of the big cardboard bulk boxes of them. No special storage.
 
Diced tomatoes definitely start to get can tasting. The high acidity makes that inevitable. Sooner or later they'll actually eat thru the can, so make sure you're checking for any black/marred visual indications, especially around the seals. I usually dump all acid stuff in a bowl and inspect can before I add it to a recipe.

Trust your nose before tasting. When you taste something, place it on your tongue and wait before chewing. Your body is very good at identifying when something is off if you listen to it. Remember we're not fighting zombies right now, so throwing an item out even on a hunch is a good idea.

THIS, x eleventybillion. The few items I've had go bad (number is in the single digits) were easily identifiable as spoiled when opened.

Back on track: Hellman's Mayo expired in Feb. 2013, still tasted great in tuna, which expired in Oct. 2013.
 
How did you have it stored?

My son recently had a Ramen packet from 2010 (code on the back read: 051110 JV 11:43) and didn't complain.

We keep them in a medium size Tupperware container without an O2 absorber.

This was one of those instant lunch cups, I am guessing the bricks of ramen might store a lot better because there's not anything else mixed in with the dried noodles. It was still shrink wrapped, and stored in a microwave cart.
 
This was one of those instant lunch cups, I am guessing the bricks of ramen might store a lot better because there's not anything else mixed in with the dried noodles. It was still shrink wrapped, and stored in a microwave cart.

Seems reasonable.
 
Way way back years ago, I bought up a bunch of x-MRE components that were sold by Ocean State Job Lot. They were entrees and desserts. All in foil packets in cardboard boxes. I left them in our basement cold-room pantry for, no kidding, probably 20 years total. Once and a while I'd open one up to see if it was poison but they remained edible. I just recently threw them away because I couldn't bring myself to eat one even though my nose and eyeballs didn't tell me 'no'. My head did.

We used to buy off-the-shelf items for long term storage in addition to our canning. We've since cycled all of that material out as the cans will begin to fail and once one goes, the rest begin to go and some items just begins to dissentigrate. We did, however, continue to store two critical canned items: canned cooked bacon.....YUM!........and Red Feather NZ Butter in cans. Recently we decided to eat one and boy oh boy was that butter extraordinary. Fortunately those cans look great. We'll probably use them camping this Summer/Fall, however. I'd hate to lose 'em. How long items survive is really hit or miss. Even properly canned items will lose their appeal.

When we bought our house from 1888, I swear the basement canning pantry was filled with canning that reminded me of Frankenstein's Lab. The items floating in the big jars did not resemble anything I would dig up and can, that's for sure. We carried probably four large wheelbarrows full of old canning to the back yard, dug a big pit, and opened and dumped the contents into the hole and buried them. To this day, 30+ years later, nothing grows there. No kidding..

Anyone here store UHT (Ultra High Temperature) milk? I've drunk it cold and found it to be just slightly sweet with a bit more body than whole milk. My wife does not like the texture. However, it's got a long shelf life. Recently, Cook's Magazine use some in a recipe with great success. Just curious.

Rome
 
you can actually make your own MRE's. You buy retort packages, a chamber vacuum sealer and a pressure canner. Google it. If I can ever afford the chamber vacuum sealer I am doing this. It will allow me to have shelf stable, non breakable, meals, ready to eat.
 
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