So you bought too much meat during your last grocery run and decided to stash some of it in the freezer until a later date. But then you forget all about it—until months later, when you find those chicken breasts, turkey burgers or skirt steaks hidden in the back of your freezer. 

You think to yourself: “How long does meat last in the freezer—and can I still eat what I’ve been storing in mine for, like, ever?” Well, the good news is that you can pretty much keep frozen meat around indefinitely and it’ll still be safe, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Phew! 

Buuuut…we do have a bit of bad news to share. Just because frozen meat won’t go bad, per say, doesn’t mean it’ll always taste good once you decide to thaw it out and grill, sear or pan-fry it. As the USDA notes, the quality of frozen foods decreases over time. Womp, womp.

This article, and several like it that have been making the rounds these days, are complete and utter nonsense. IF you package the meat properly, and IF you keep it at a nice 0-degree-or-less temperature, it will last for years. I know this because I eat meat that is way older than a year all the time.

To be fair, there are other variables involved…how you cook it, for example. Will a rare steak taste from five years ago taste as good as one purchased yesterday? I don’t know. But I do know with utter certainty that meat used in stews, soups, sauces, and that sort of thing will taste just fine. Tacos, enchilladas, spaghetti sauces, sloppy joes, stews, soups, that sort of thing….not an issue at all.

I have eaten frozen turkey that was at least five or six years old. I just recently has some meat that was about ten years old. No problems whatsoever.

But, as I said, it’s all about the prep and storage. You’ve got to keep air from contacting the meat. I use a vacuum sealer but you might get away with plastic wrap if you make sure to wrap it thoroughly and to leave no voids with air.

After that, you need to get that meat down into the -0 range and keep it there. The freezer in your fridge will not be the optimal choice for this task. A dedicated chest freezer is the ticket.

I’ve noticed that articles like these are abounding lately. I wonder if it’s a concerted effort to get the population used to the idea of eating out of their freezer because of expected shortages and high pricing….or is it just coincidence? Hmm.

So, yeah, it was a good deal at WinCo yesterday on chicken. A really good deal. And WinCo is one half of my weekend grocery shopping…the other half being CostCo. And CostCo had a nice chicken andouille sausage available that I like. And I picked up my weekly bag of frozen shrimp for the quick shrimp scampi that I enjoy for dinner. Hmmm….Chicken, andouille, and shrimp…..that can only mean one thing: etouffee or jambalaya, depending on your adherence to Cajun canon.

Regardless, it was yummy and will be a nice dish when winter finally sets in here. In case anyone cares:

• 1 green pepper, diced
• 1 onion, diced
• a few stalks of celery, diced
• Chicken
• Sausage
• Shrimp
• Bay leaves
• 2 tsp thyme
• Salt/pepper
• Tabasco
• Bacon drippings
• 15 oz. crushed tomatoes
• 6 clove garlic
• 15 oz tomato sauce
• 2 cups water

You should be able to figure out the rest from there.

I did cook the shrimp separately and added them at the last couple minutes of the process so to avoid overcooking them. Other than that, its pretty straightforward. I liked a thicker finished product, so I reduced it more than I probably should have. If I exclude the shrimp, theres nothing in here that won’t pressure can nicely into jars for later off-the-shelf use.

Manufacturers have used the labels for decades to estimate peak freshness. Unlike “use by” labels, which are found on perishable foods like meat and dairy, “best before” labels have nothing to do with safety and may encourage consumers to throw away food that’s perfectly fine to eat.

“They read these dates and then they assume that it’s bad, they can’t eat it and they toss it, when these dates don’t actually mean that they’re not edible or they’re not still nutritious or tasty,” said Patty Apple, a manager at Food Shift, an Alameda, California, nonprofit that collects and uses expired or imperfect foods.

There’s a big difference between “Best By” and an expiration date. And, lets be real, those expiration dates are usually kinda bogus too. Here’s the simple truth: most canned food will be edible long past the dates on the can. Yes, there maybe some nutritional loss. Yes, there may be some loss of taste/texture. But will it be unhealthy or dangerous? Usually no.

I routinely eat stuff that is a year or two past the date on the can. (Non-canned food is a different matter. And, in this case, ‘canned’ means food in cans and jars.) I’ve had only a few bad experiences. Usually a can starts bulging and, as you know, thats theuniversal sign for ‘dont eat this or else’.

The ‘Best By’ hasnothing to do with food safety or an expiration date. I’d go so far as to say its just a convenient Jedi mind trick to make people throw away food that is past the date. Gyno-Americans are notorious for this. I have had arguments about using a can of corn that was two months past expiration, and I’ve had people absolutely aghast that I would eat meat out of my deep freeze that was more than six months old.

Hey, when youre hungry and broke you will discover rather quickly that those dates on the can are like Walk/DontWalk signs….you can obey them, but if you have half a brain you can ignore them and figure it out for yourself with good results most of the time.

Is there anything that I do get rigid about in regards to dates? Milk. Thats about it. And the people who actually observe the BestBy dates on bottled water are seriously in need of testosterone. it’s hydrogen and oxygen, fer Crom’s sake.

But…no one ever went broke underestimating the gullibility of the buying public.

A while back I had posted that Winco has seen boneless skinless chicken breast increase by 40% over six months.  Was up there the other day and, surprise, it bumped up another ten cents a pound. How’s that Inflation Reduction Act workin’ for ya?

Speaking of food, I had to refill my sugar container that I keep in the kitchen. No problem, check the stockpiles and I have several 5# bags of sugar vacuum sealed for just this sort of thing. Todays volunteer was a bag of sugar that went into storage back in 2015.

How did it fare? Why, just fine. There were a few clumps in there that were easily broken up by shaking the container thoroughly. Other than that, it stored just fine…as expected. The vacuum sealing protects from moisture and bugs quite nicely and, really, thats the two biggest threats to storing sugar. I wish I had written down the price I paid seven years ago because it is always interesting to see how these things change.

When it comes to storing sugar, by the way, my usual policy is to drop the bag of sugar into a vacuum seal bag, seal it up, date it, and put it in a 5-gallon bucket with the others. Then it goes into the basement and sits on a shelf until needed. I keep about 40 or 50 pounds of sugar on hand this way. More than enough to get me through a crisis. I also store salt this way as well…not so much for the concern over bugs, but rather over keeping moisture away.

If you haven’t already got a vauum sealer, I cannot recommend them enough. They are one of the most useful tools for stockpiling things. You have to think outside the box, because these things are great for more than just putting away food.