MSE News: Food labelling shake-up 'to save shoppers £1 billion' 29 November 2017 at 4:20PM in Food shopping & groceries 25 replies 4.2K views

Former_MSE_Callum

New food labelling guidance that could save shoppers £1 billion a year by prolonging the lifespan of food and stopping edible items being thrown out has been published today...

Read the full story:
'Food labelling shake-up 'to save shoppers £1 billion' - are you keeping the right fruit and veg in the fridge?'

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Wizard_of_Id

I belong to the generation of people that were taught food facts by our mothers and don't need anything on the label to tell us how to treat food. I also learned not to buy more than I can eat in a certain time frame and that way there is no food wasted in my house.

It is simply laziness on the part of people not wanting to think for themselves and thus needing to be TOLD what to do with their food after they have bought it.

robin58

How much more do we have to dumb down things because of the snowflake generation.

By the way WASHED eggs are kept in the fridge. USA have to store eggs in fridges because of this.

In UK eggs are not washed so can be kept outside the fridge.

glider3560

robin58 wrote: »

How much more do we have to dumb down things because of the snowflake generation.

By the way WASHED eggs are kept in the fridge. USA have to store eggs in fridges because of this.

In UK eggs are not washed so can be kept outside the fridge.

Also, the UK's chickens are vaccinated against salmonella, whereas vaccination is still in it's infancy in the US. One of the reasons why they wash them and therefore they have to be kept in the fridge.

Caddyman

Have to admit, never kept eggs still in their carton, in the fridge. Supermarkets don't keep eggs in the fridge. We buy a carton, they stay out of the fridge until they're used.

As for everything else, commonsense applies, oh, yes, I forgot, commonsense seems to be somewhat lacking in society today.....

PasturesNew

I don't want to save £1billion - can't they just send me a cheque?

Elliesmum

Hallelujah

I'm fed up of hiding packaging from my OH as he is OTT when it comes to use by dates. To him, it's out of date and therefore should not be eaten...

My eggs are kept in a ceramic chicken out of the fridge - never had a problem there either.

EM x

VoucherMan

So not doing anything about the often pointless best before dates that many misunderstand and confuse with use by dates!

I know a few that will not eat anything past this date, yet I have tins,jars, packets well past the best before dates (still plenty of 2014 & 2015 dated stuff). Unless they can educate people about these, which is doubtful since it hasn't worked yet, or convince the manufacturers to be a little more sensible in their dating policies, that's where mountains of waste will continue to be an issue.

Pollycat

VoucherMan wrote: »

So not doing anything about the often pointless best before dates that many misunderstand and confuse with use by dates!

I can't understand why some people find it so hard to differentiate between the 2 phrases.

But then again, I'm one of those people who don't take rigid notice of 'use by' dates anyway.
I use my tongue and nose to tell if it's OK to eat.

I've got an unopened mango yogurt in my fridge (big one) dated 'use by 24/11' and I'll have some for lunch today, tomorrow and Saturday.
And I'll still be posting next week.

I think the oldest item I've used was a tin of condensed lentil soup that had rolled under my storage rack in the garage.

Pollycat wrote: »

OK. How about this for not wasting food.

I found a can of condensed Campbell's lentil soup under my food shelf in my garage.
The 'best before' date was Oct 2008!

Not dented or blown.
Opened it, it looked OK, smelled OK.
Added water, tasted OK.
It's in the slow cooker with lamb, potatoes, turnip, carrots, onions & leeks.

Just curious if anyone else would have used it too.

Posted 14/4/2017 - and it tasted good.

Former_MSE_Andrea

In my house we try not to waste food at all if we can help it, I'm very keen to bring my kids up knowing this. If we think something might be on the way out we do the "sniff test". If it smells ok we eat it

VfM4meplse

Elliesmum wrote: »

Hallelujah

I'm fed up of hiding packaging from my OH as he is OTT when it comes to use by dates. To him, it's out of date and therefore should not be eaten...

Same here - but in my case it’s the snobbishness about buying food plastered with yellow stickers! Despite then going on to enjoy the fruits of my frugal ways. Much of the stuff I get just wouldn’t be bought at full price.