Submitted by Overseer090 t3_10pduog in explainlikeimfive
Especially foods with a long shelf life. How do they know it'll keep for 27 months or whatever?
Comments
BadWrongBadong t1_j6l5agz wrote
I can imagine it would be much more risky from a liability standpoint to have a spoilage-based date on foods.
stephanepare t1_j6lki92 wrote
That's half the reason. The other reason is for marketing purposes. This way, you guarantee taste, not edibility. You get less complaints that your stuff doesn't taste good, as people know they're past the "best before" date.
ro6in t1_j6k9t7c wrote
A relative of mine used to work in the field of frozen food. They conducted a "crash test": If you defrost and re-freeze food several times, this mimics "decay" in a quicker way. From those results, they could figure out shelf life (without actually having to wait e.g. 27 months).
Overseer090 OP t1_j6ke5d6 wrote
Aha, I was wondering if there was a way they could imitate decay!
Gigantic_Idiot t1_j6lfmiu wrote
On the flip side, there's heated chambers that do the same thing. There are some companies that will legit evaluate their product every week/month during development until is no longer meets quality or safety specs.
Overseer090 OP t1_j6li99p wrote
Cool! Still wonder how they've worked that out!
johndoe30x1 t1_j6l8uqi wrote
It is completely unregulated except for infant food and formula. That said, companies tend to err on the side of caution as it’s better for business for customers to throw out products that might still be edible as opposed to facing lawsuits over spoiled food.
Overseer090 OP t1_j6lambh wrote
Interesting! Didn't know there was no regulation around it.
[deleted] t1_j6jub85 wrote
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Hydroblitz3307 t1_j6juboz wrote
They don’t really know, thats why some food spoils faster than the date. They just know how long the food has until its freshness or “perfect flavor” is left until its not in a sellable quality
stephanepare t1_j6juhdm wrote
The "best before" date is actualy a "tastes optimal if opened before". It's a guestimate, based on experiments. It has nothing to do with food spoiling, so they can afford to approximate.
Usually, there are some tests before launching some new product line with different sealed containers sitting there for different amounts of time at room temperature or fridges. For dates a year or more away, they guess using science. Petri dish cultures, for example, can help them extrapolate future dates just by watching the bacteria growth rate.