While having Chinese food last night, I noticed that my bottle of soy sauce is nearly empty. It then occurred to me that this bottle is several years old. It is at least 10 years old and probably more like 15. If there ever was an expiration date on the bottle, it is long gone. Tastes the same to me. Does this stuff spoil? Have I slowly been poisoning myself?
There’s a lot of salt in soy sauce so I doubt you will get much bacterial growth, but at room temperature and exposed to air the flavor will change over time.
I doubt it. The salt content is quite high, and it’s already fermented. As long as it tastes fine to you, I say enjoy.
The breakdown of any organic material in it could make it taste bad… if you can taste anything past all that salt.
There are some subtle flavor notes I detect in freshly opened soy sauce that seem to go flat over time in older bottles.
They refill the bottles from a big soy sauce container, I think.
oops, sorry! thought you meant you were in a Chinese restaurant!
I’ve noticed some old plastic containers of soy sauce have gotten nearly empty without me ever having opened them.
I figured it was caused by evaporation. That means what’s left behind is concentrated soy sauce!
I found a full bottle that is over 15 years old in the back of a cupboard. Way past its supposed use by date. It tastes great. I mean better than the new. Your taste may vary from mine, but I really thought that this one had aged rather well. It was in the dark, which can be important, depending upon what it is (some chutneys require exposure to the sun to create their best flavour, other foods get off tastes very quickly when exposed to sunlight - beer and olive oil for instance.)
i’ve had a one gallon container of soy sauce in my pantry that’s over three years old. i refill the bottle in the fridge maybe once or twice a year.