I buy Hormel Natural Choice Applewood Smoked Turkey Deli Lunchmeat, 8 oz Resealable Package.
I’ve noticed the sell by date is usually six to eight weeks beyond when I purchase.
The packages are sealed. I wouldn’t say they’re vacuum sealed. The plastic isn’t sucked in hard against the meat.
I’d estimate most of the air in the package is removed.
I’ve always been told that once it’s opened that lunch meat should be consumed within 5 to 7 days. I’m extremely nervous about food poisoning and throw out the meat long before it smells off.
Is it really safe to buy lunch meat and toss it in the fridge for 5 weeks? (assuming its within the sell by date window)
Why does it go bad so quickly after opening and resealing?
This lunch meat is about $5 a package. I’ve always used it within a couple weeks of buying. Then within 5 days of opening the package.
A visit to the ER can cost thousands. I rather throw away $5 and avoid any risk. I have thrown out unopened packages of lunch meat if they’ve been in my fridge several weeks. I don’t trust the sell by date.
My understanding is that it is not air in the package, instead it is something like an nitrogen/carbon dioxide mixture. Thus there is no oxygen in the package [and bacteria need oxygen to grow]. When you open the package the oxygen and the bacteria rush in and the bacteria start growing.
I remember my mom always stored bacon and lunch meat in the freezer until it was time to open it and use.
That doesn’t seem necessary anymore. It’s too convenient to buy meat fresh from the store. I’m at the grocery every week for the basics like eggs, bread, milk etc.
I recall thinly sliced lunch meat freezer burns quickly. I haven’t tried storing lunch meat in my freezer in many, many years.
You need to wrap it very well, and not just in plastic wrap or ziplok bags. They should be frozen well-wrapped in coated butcher freezer paper or something similar.
In addition to keeping oxygen out, the packaging will also keep bacteria out. There were probably bacteria in the meat before it was sealed, too, but there are ways of killing them after sealing (could be as simple as heating it (since the meat’s pre-cooked anyway), could be something like radiation).
I appreciate the comments. It’s reassuring to better understand the packaging of lunch meats and why the sell buy date is 4 to 6 weeks beyond our purchase.
Of course, it depends on the grocery. Walmart’s stock turnover is fast. Their lunch meat doesn’t sit in the display case for very long.
Also, it helps that lunch meat is already cooked.
Bacon has a much shorter sell by date. It’s raw pork.
It’ll also depend on how treated the lunch meat is. In general, saltier meats will last longer, and some heavily-salted sausages can be kept pretty much indefinitely at room temperature.
Huh, I wasn’t aware there were any laws on food-package dates (other than specifically for baby food). Mostly, they’re just there because consumers expect them (and some of them are far more conservative than necessary, because consumers would be distrustful of a more accurate date).
Some of them are more conservative than necessary because they test them before making a claim, and testing “how long does this keep” takes time = money. Most medicines are good for far longer than the date on the label for this reason. (And a few aren’t.) If your olives have a use-by date, that’s how long they tested them. I opened a bottle of olives 2-3 years after it’s listed date, and they were fine.
I’m obviously less nervous about food poisoning than the OP.
It’s true that curing and smoking have preservative value, but those meats are still moist enough that pathogen growth will eventually occur. Just less quickly than uncured fresh meat.
(Most meats that are truly room-temperature-stable for extended time periods are thoroughly dried and/or heavily salt-cured… like dry sausages and country-style hams. Retail bacon isn’t that dry or that salty.)
The whole “Use by”/“Sell by”/“Best by” is a mess. Manufacturers have no real incentive to push dates longer in most cases: if they can get you or the store to throw it away, yay. Even when they’re trying to be as realistic as possible, they have to look at worst-case scenarios. E.g., do those Tylenol caps really go bad in a dark, cool cupboard? Almost certainly no; but in the glove compartment in summer, maybe.
And they often can’t even express what they want to say coherently: I keep seeing, “After opening, use within 7-10 days”. That makes no sense unless they mean you’re supposed to open it and then wait a week to use it! Just “within 10 days”. English, mother****ers!
I have a friend in the food industry in Taiwan and he explained that one of the problems is that by Taiwanese law, they have to use the time for the ingredient with the shortest time, even if it’s a minor ingredient.
Meat that’s cooked, brined, smoked, and/or otherwise preserved will last quite a lot longer than a week at refrigerator temps. That’s the original intent of these processes, not just for flavor, although in modern times the smoke is just flavoring and the preservation is largely managed by other chemicals.
Myself, certainly I’ve used these products a month after opening, even longer. I’ve kept open bacon for so long that I lost track, perhaps 6 months. Smell is a good enough guide for me. But I wouldn’t advise you to do that, nor would the seller, because I don’t know anything about your preference, risk tolerance, or medical condition. Allowing for that, the producer must err on the side of caution.
There’s also things that “go bad” by becoming unpalatable, and things that “go bad” by becoming dangerous. And for the first category, different people will have different thresholds for what’s acceptable, or might even prefer what most folks consider inferior.
And then there’s things like mold. Most food mold is actually harmless, but some of it is toxic, and it’s a lot easier to just throw out anything moldy than to try to figure out which is which.
