help - out of date flour

zippychick

Hi Nettles 77:hello:

Now you have a few answers, I have added your thread to the existing one on out of date flour:D

thanks:)
Zip

The_Thrilla

Just found this out. There are usually weevil eggs in flour. If you are planning to store flour for a long time, you can kill off the weevil eggs by putting the flour in the freezer for at least 72 hours. After that, you can store in sealed Mylar bags, after pressing as much air out as possible, for more or less as long as you like. Or, I suppose, you can just leave it in the freezer.

bananadog

Hi
I have some flour from a friend dated febuary 2011 but the bag was not opened...do you think it will still be ok to use in my breadmaker or should I throw it away?
thanks

BitterAndTwisted

My motto is to never throw away anything unless I am absolutely certain that something is !00% guaranteed inedible.

As I'm sure you're aware most "best before" dates have a huge margin of error built into them and most if not all foods will be perfectly acceptable quite a long time after that date. In the case of wholemeal flour the risk is of the oil in the wheatgerm going rancid. Should this happen (and only one month or so after the bb date makes this very unlikely) you will almost certainly be able to smell it.

I say "Use and enjoy!"

Barneysmom

I usually ignore BBD on dried food apart from oats.

bananadog

ty, you actually reminded me of when I had flour in a glass sealed jar in the back of a cupboard...when I went to have a clear out i remeber it being a horrid clolour and when I opened it I was nearly sick with the smell!!!! I threw the flour away but even though it was in a glass jar nothing would get rid of the smell and I ended up having to throw that out aswell!!!
ok...now I am confident this flour is fine as it smells fine and looks fine too
...off to the breadmaker!

belfastgirl23

It would need to be a year or so out of date before I'd even give it a thought

SunshineBear

It will be fine as long as it isn't or hasn't been damp or has anything wriggling in it!!

SB

imogen-p

If it's only the best before date that's Feb '11 I'd say use it, after all best before isn't the same as use by.

zippychick

Ive merged this with a thread on out of date flour.

I always have out of date flour knocking around and it works perfectly for me every time. A few months ago i was given some by the local shop as they wouldn't sell it! Woopeeeeee!