Expired meats

[Johnny]

I'm all in for a good deal on some barbecue meats. What I ran into today at the grocery store was a little beyond what I'd consider "safe". Pork butts that have a sell-by date of 21 March that are on sale 27 March for 5 bucks off?

Nah.... I'm all about getting a good deal, but 6 days outside of expiration date is a little too risky for me. No thanks. I'll pass.

[44044]

Go for it...

Let us know how 'it' comes out

[4thIDvet]

Originally Posted by Johnny

I'm all in for a good deal on some barbecue meats. What I ran into today at the grocery store was a little beyond what I'd consider "safe". Pork butts that have a sell-by date of 21 March that are on sale 27 March for 5 bucks off?

Nah.... I'm all about getting a good deal, but 6 days outside of expiration date is a little too risky for me. No thanks. I'll pass.

You better ask boon about that one Johnny. A friend here in town used to buy out of date meat that started to smell. He said it was aged meat and was great. Damn it smelled.
So I researched store bought and high end steak house aged meat. Hell it had to be kept at I think just above freezing with almost like no 0 humidity. I showed him and told him he was just eating rotten meat. He kept buying it.
He is dead now died of some frigging brain disease.

[drh]

Originally Posted by 44044

Go for it...

Let us know how 'it' comes out

I expect it will come out really, really fast

[baboon]

Dates depending on company policy and who is actually weigh the product play in to this/ The packing house has a sell by date on the box. The scale on items that are whole & in cryovac should not have a date programed into the scale. That way the person weighing it has to manually enter the date.

Know depending on the employee they could have fucked up that date when entering it into the scale. It's very common to be working on some thing to be interrupted in the mild of what you were doing. Hell I know I have done it & had too turn around & reprice the product I just repriced & was putting out.

Here where I shop if it goes out of date its 50% off. And by out of date they mean until midnight of that date. I currently have 3 pork bellies in my freezer that went out of date. I'm now waiting on Corned Beef the Lamb tp go out of date so I can snag that up.

I can go as far & tell youth that date date does not mean shit if that product got hot somewhere along its life. The refrigeration goes out at night and no one pulls it. Someone decides they don't want it & dumps it on a shelf. It could also be left at the register & not returned to refrigeration.

If you doubt something talk to the people that work in the market. In your case with it being 6v days out. I'd ask ifs the would open it son I could smell it. They might just tell youbno the apprentice is an idiot.

[aviator]

We buy meat from Publix and most of the times it's always fresh, but sometimes I wonder (not really) why the top of the steaks are bright red and the bottom touching other steaks are much darker when you open the package....bleach maybe? But they never smell old or bad. They are very good at keeping fresh stuff on the shelves.

[4thIDvet]

Originally Posted by aviator

We buy meat from Publix and most of the times it's always fresh, but sometimes I wonder (not really) why the top of the steaks are bright red and the bottom touching other steaks are much darker when you open the package....bleach maybe? But they never smell old or bad. They are very good at keeping fresh stuff on the shelves.

Fred Publix is top dollar I don't think I have ever seen an 'over date sale' in any of their stores?
They had to put locks on their dumpsters people were fighting to get their throw aways.

[baboon]

Originally Posted by aviator

We buy meat from Publix and most of the times it's always fresh, but sometimes I wonder (not really) why the top of the steaks are bright red and the bottom touching other steaks are much darker when you open the package....bleach maybe? But they never smell old or bad. They are very good at keeping fresh stuff on the shelves.

Oxidation when meat touches meat air can't reach it. Ever notice on ground meat the inside being darker? Whoever made that grind ground it to tight into his hand. A real meat cutter lays on the foot pedal unit the pan with trays are full. One continuous movement with both hands. A experienced meat cutter grinds it loosely so it does not turn dark.

Most every market I worked in had a bloom cooler the temperature & air flow brought out the bright red that people assume means supper fresh. The newer stores & poorly remodeled don't have bloom coolers. I have seen ground meat get put into a freezer ton hasten the bloom on what would be a darker grind. Darker grinds are from adding yesterdays ground meat back into a fresh grind or it could be a lot of trim that has bled out.

So many of todays big chains are only generating 80/20 trim. There is way more profit in grinding tube meat. Tube meat is a 10 pound roll like roll breakfast sausage comes in. Fat to lean ratios are 75/25 all the fat up 98% lean.

When I was an apprentice we ground "Bull Meat". It came in a 60 or 70 pound frozen block. It was nothing more then an old used up bull cut up & every thing used including ribeyes & tenderloins. Bull tend to every lean from breeding & fighting for dominance. Most your bulls are castrated to put on fat & be less aggressive. A castrated bull is a steer.

[4thIDvet]

boon do they use old milk cows for anything. Like Elsie the cow?

[baboon]

Originally Posted by 4thIDvet

boon do they use old milk cows for anything. Like Elsie the cow?

I'm not really sure on that but I expect they do go to slaughter.

You know its really hard to fathom how much beef is processed in America. Back in the good old days when a BBQ weekend happened, and briskets would go on sale for .99 cents a pound it was nothing too go thru 9 pallets of them during a 3 day weekend. And I'm talking one store in one city in one state. A pallet could easily be 3,000 pounds.

Out here where I live Farms dot the landscape. It's damn near impossible not to see several checking trucks on the road in a 30 minute time period.

[aviator]

Thank you boon for the explanation, I thought maybe they sprayed bleach on them to keep it bright red.

[baboon]

Originally Posted by aviator

Thank you boon for the explanation, I thought maybe they sprayed bleach on them to keep it bright red.

Bleach works wonders on cleaning the plastic white butcher blocks, but it needs to be was rinsed & sanitized.

I generally shop early, I when I go into a store & the just cleaned the meat cases & I can smell bleach I know I'm in the right store. Even walking into a market the smell tells me a lot about how its run.

[aviator]

Originally Posted by baboon

Bleach works wonders on cleaning the plastic white butcher blocks, but it needs to be was rinsed & sanitized.

I generally shop early, I when I go into a store & the just cleaned the meat cases & I can smell bleach I know I'm in the right store. Even walking into a market the smell tells me a lot about how its run.

Wood is the best for cutting boards, once it's dry it gets sanitized, but yes you need to wash it. I only use a wood cutting board my youngest son made as a shop project in High school, he was surprised I was still using it 26 years later.

[baboon]

Originally Posted by aviator

Wood is the best for cutting boards, once it's dry it gets sanitized, but yes you need to wash it. I only use a wood cutting board my youngest son made as a shop project in High school, he was surprised I was still using it 26 years later.

Wood cutting blocks won't pass most cities health departments. City of Houston made us go to plastic handles because wood hold bacteria. The best way to clean old wooden blocks it to salt them down. The salt draws up the moisture, the scrap them with a block scraper.

I have some old thermo plastic blocks that were cut down for home use. Both the ones I have will fit in the dishwasher. After I use them I generally rinse them with hot water before the dishwasher. They get old school bleaching if needed. What I like about the plastic is you can see when they need bleaching. Your not going to bleach a laminated wood block or cutting board.

[Johnny]

Originally Posted by 4thIDvet

You better ask boon about that one Johnny. A friend here in town used to buy out of date meat that started to smell. He said it was aged meat and was great. Damn it smelled.
So I researched store bought and high end steak house aged meat. Hell it had to be kept at I think just above freezing with almost like no 0 humidity. I showed him and told him he was just eating rotten meat. He kept buying it.
He is dead now died of some frigging brain disease.

Yep. Everything in moderation. A day or two over the line? No problem.

When it's starting to stink? No way!