The label says “best by” and I can’t tell if the food is safe
The yogurt is two days past the date and looks fine. I’m about to put it in my kid’s lunch. — Parent, 2025
In 2022, NPR reported that Montana milk had to come off the shelf 12 days after it was pasteurized. Stores had to throw the full cartons in the garbage. Not down the drain, either. That’s against the rules too. Except for baby formula, no federal regulation says food needs a date at all. The closest thing to a fix is a recommended phrase, “Best if Used By,” and it speaks for quality, not safety. Somebody picked the number on your carton.
For now: look up the food in the USDA’s FoodKeeper app, which lists how long it keeps in the refrigerator, freezer and pantry.
The full file
Date labels started as the store’s business, not yours. Manufacturers and retailers stamped symbols and number codes on food so they could rotate stock, and shoppers couldn’t read them. In the 1970s, plain dates began to spread across stores, for the people buying the food.
It helped less than anyone hoped. In a 2025 Harris Poll survey of 2,069 U.S. adults, an average of 87% said they knew what eight date labels meant. On a quiz about them, an average of 53% got them right.
The FDA has since asked food companies to use that phrase for dates that mark quality. The USDA adds that food with no signs of spoilage may still be eaten after the date. Washington asked nicely.
Relates to No. 00450.
Run into this too?
Know a fix? Leave it for the next person. Any name will do. Every comment is read. A fix that holds up goes on the record. A fix that doesn't is noted, quietly.
Follow to comment Already following? Sign in
Free. One email a week.
Did we get something wrong? It happens. We fix it, note the change, and take it personally. Tell the clerk
Already solved somewhere? Tell us. Every claimed solve is checked before anything changes. We are hard to impress. Report a solve