Out of date, out of bowl?

[KGWatkins]

When my stepfather first got on disability and had a heart attack too, there were medical bills REALLY high and no income, no insurance, we relied on the food banks A LOT for that whole year, We got the "expired" food and we ate it, we had no choice, it was that or starve, it's not as bad as everyone believes it is. The cereal wasn't stale everything was just fine and people would be aghast when we said we ate "expired" food, but let me tell you, expired food saved our lives that year, so I would never look down on food banks.

[kali]

I used to get out of date food for free quite often for my dogs from the dog food companies. Never had an issue.

[Ashling]

Out of date or "best before" dates are just so people won't sue companies for giving them food that *might* be off, or not as fresh as they would like.

[diljaa]

I would definitely go for it. It's not like it's a year or something past it's expiration date, a couple of weeks isn't going to change anything since it's dry food.

I know the manager at a local grocery store and he was telling me how they throw away so much of expired food that's perfectly okay. Makes you feel so bad knowing there are people starving out there. He told me they tried to donate to a food bank but they wouldn't accept any expired products which I find crazy. There's a lot of people out there struggling to make ends meet every month. I understand that they wouldn't accept all expired products, like dairy and unfrozen meat and stuff. But canned goods, crackers and flour and stuff that's dry and packed in the right way isn't ruined a couple of days past it's expiration day