Tip of the Week: Expiration Dates*

This week's tip comes from Melea Johnson of freebies2deals.com. She has a great deal blog, and I encourage you to check it out.


Ever wonder if you can still eat that bread, canned soup or frozen package of meat?  There are a lot of different types of expiration dates out there.  Some are pretty straightforward and some give you a little leeway when it comes to how long you can keep it on a shelf before you eat it.  Here is a breakdown of those terms to help you out:

Use-By Date (or expiration date):  is the clear concise date you have to eat your food by.  If you don’t, it is no longer considered safe.

Best-Before or Best-By Date:  is an estimate and usually found on things like Cereal, Snacks, Frozen Foods… You can usually eat food past the Best-Before Date and be fine.

Sell-By Date:  is the date that is used for store and manufacturer purposes to help with inventory control. It is a date to help stores know when to have the food sold so that consumers have plenty of time to eat the product before its actual expiration date. In all honesty, it shouldn’t even be shown on packaging because it confuses consumers.

Baked-on  Date:  is the day the food was actually made.  Typically, you have 7 days to eat it safely before it starts to go bad.

*Originally distributed March 2014