# Old hamburger **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** food-cooking\ **Created:** [July 19, 2022, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224 "2022-07-19T21:04:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![tofor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tofor/32/13727_2.png) [@tofor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tofor)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/21 "2022-07-20T12:17:19Z")
It would never have occurred to me to wonder about the safety of something that had been in the freezer for less than 2 years. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/22 "2022-07-20T12:48:17Z")
Other than spices, nuts and dried fruit, I doubt I have anything older than six months old in my freezer. Why have food in your house and not eat it? ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/23 "2022-07-20T15:09:03Z")
I’ve seen freezer burn on 4 month old packages of hamburger. The thin plastic doesn’t protect it. I’ve started wrapping the entire package in several layers of plastic wrap before freezing. That helps for a few extra months. For longer storage, I remove the ground meat and put in a Ziploc freezer bag. Squeeze out as much air as possible. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/24 "2022-07-20T15:15:01Z")
> [@GreysonCarlisle](#): > > That’s a concern. We use the bag of ice cubes test to identify any power outages while we slept or were gone. (Put a few ice cubes into a zip lock bag. If the power goes out for a significant length of time, the cubes will partially melt.) We haven’t had any long outages in years. I have a “thaw detector” in my freezer: A small sealed container of ice, with a penny sitting on top of the ice. If the penny ever ends up on the bottom of the ice, it’s thawed. > [@Alessan](#): > > Why have food in your house and not eat it? For one thing, you might get a large bounty of a particular sort of food all at once: Maybe there was a really great sale on a particular product, or maybe you had an unusually big holiday feast with a lot of leftovers. And you don’t want to eat that same thing every day for a month. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/25 "2022-07-20T19:11:20Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Other than spices, nuts and dried fruit, I doubt I have anything older than six months old in my freezer. Why have food in your house and not eat it? 1. It was in the back and I forgot about it 2. Seasonal bounty (I can see your point if you’d said a year, rather than 6 months. I’m not that organized, but many are.) 3. emergency supplies I routinely eat stuff that’s more than a year old, and never worry about it unless it looks or smells or feels wrong. Stale is a lot more common than dangerous. But the only time I’ve ever had food poisoning, it was from restaurant take-out at a large party, and I suspect prior contamination rather than “sat out too long”. (Everyone who ate the fried chicken got sick, not just me.) If the food is something I want to eat, and it looks and smells and feels okay, I’ll happily risk a 0.1% chance of food poisoning. ---
**Author:** ![GreysonCarlisle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a87d85/32.png) [@GreysonCarlisle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreysonCarlisle)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/26 "2022-07-20T21:03:31Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > How much can 2 pounds of ground beef cost? It’s the waste of good food that bugs me. It just sits wrong. > [@](#): > > I’d rather spend that money that risk even a 0.1% chance of food poisoning. > [@puzzlegal](#): > > If the food is something I want to eat, and it looks and smells and feels okay, I’ll happily risk a 0.1% chance of food poisoning. If it was just me, I’d scarf it down. But I don’t want to make my girlfriend sick. And I’m worried that after I cook it, it won’t taste good, and that’ll mean even more wasted food. Turns out that we have other dinner plans for tonight, so the spaghetti will have to wait until tomorrow. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/27 "2022-07-20T21:06:41Z")
I am sure it’s safe, and if you use it for spaghetti any weirdness (freezer burn type stuff, not the food being rotten) would probably be drowned out by marinara and spices. That’s a good way to use it. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/28 "2022-07-20T21:11:13Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > I’ve seen freezer burn on 4 month old packages of hamburger. The thin plastic doesn’t protect it. I’ve started wrapping the entire package in several layers of plastic wrap before freezing. That helps for a few extra months. Note that the OP isn’t talking about hamburger on those foam trays and covered in thin plastic wrap. Instead, they said the meat is in a chub, which in my experience is in thicker plastic. ---
**Author:** ![GreysonCarlisle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a87d85/32.png) [@GreysonCarlisle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreysonCarlisle)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2022, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/29 "2022-07-20T21:52:51Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > For longer storage, I remove the ground meat and put in a Ziploc freezer bag. Squeeze out as much air as possible. I normally buy a 10-pound lot of it, then break it down at home into (roughly) 1-pound plastic baggies. I used to wrap them in butcher paper, too, but that didn’t seem to do any good. Come to think of it, that’s probably how those two little tubes got lost. I wasn’t looking for that sort of packaging when I wanted hamburger. ---
**Author:** ![GreysonCarlisle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a87d85/32.png) [@GreysonCarlisle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreysonCarlisle)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2022, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/30 "2022-07-23T05:43:27Z")
I think I’ve chickened out. The meat’s been fully thawed for a couple of days, and it’s still just sitting there in the fridge. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 3, 2022, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224/31 "2022-08-03T14:30:29Z")
I second this idea. If it’s been frozen the entire time, it’s certainly safe. And if it’s not freezer burned, it’s probably going to taste fine as well. Maybe not quite perfect, but certainly good enough as a component of another recipe- chili, bolognese, or even something like sloppy joes would all be good choices. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-hamburger/968224.md?page=1)