I grew up in a household with parents who were born during the Great Depression. They taught me that canned items were safe to eat unless they were dented, rusty, or swollen. And slight dents were sometimes ok too, but needed to pass other tests as this article mentioned.
Those are good rules of thumb to follow, because I’ve seen items that still weren’t at their expired or best by dates, but were swollen.
Also, if a jar doesn’t pop when it’s opened, I wouldn’t trust it. It didn’t seal properly during the preservation process.
Now, will things past their use by date taste yummy? Sometimes yes, and sometimes no. I’ve eaten crackers that were past the date when I first opened it. Fine for the first time, but not usually very good a day or two later.
That was a "nope" from me... into the trash can it went.
I usually can my own tomato products because they don't have that metallic taste that you get from the canned, but haven't had time lately. It's also such a mess of a production. I've heard you can buy canned sauce and just transfer it to jars and reprocess it. Anyone tried this?
I also use those general rules to decide whether canned goods are safe. If I’m not certain it’s good, I won’t eat it. You’d be surprised, though, at how many people (especially younger ones) think that any canned food past the date on the can is inedible and must be tossed out.
Thanks!
I was visiting a friend’s father and heard an explosion. We couldn’t find what it was but I was shaken not only from the sound but from the actual pressure change.
About a month later, he was in his kitchen and it happened again. In a top cabinet, he found two exploded cans of soup! They were expired by about a year.
“They taught me that canned items were safe to eat unless they were dented, rusty, or swollen.”
I had a can of tomatoes in my pantry that was slightly swollen, and I ignored it.
3 months later the dang thing exploded, and I spent hours cleaning up the mess
Beware of expired canned tomatoes!!