How long do Chef Boyardee cans last?

[Rick]

I understand because of the acidic tomato content they are not really a long term prepping food , yes?
But they were on sale a couple years ago and I couldnt help myself.

I dont enjoy eating them and I bought them mostly as emergency food storage to supplement my more traditionally ( bagged sealed rice in buckets) prepper foods because they were
a) industrially canned
b) relatively a lot of calories for the money
c) not just carbs but fats and proteins as well and
d) would nicely supplement my other prepper foods during SHTF with something different

So now I have about 150 cans that are maybe 3.5 years old.

Thoughts?

 

[JustMe]

As long as their not bulging on the ends, they should be good, though may have a tinny taste because of the tomato.......though I don't know if I'd store them much longer. Maybe start eating them now? Mix it into another recipe maybe??? Example,......make some homemade spaghetti or similar, then add a can or two?

 

[Wingnut]

Or donate 'em to the nearest homeless shelter, shelter for kids and/or abused women, etc. Folks in those shelters ain't gonna be too particular...

 

[ladycat]

Back in my extreme couponing days, I was getting tons of those for free.

Most of them went into the food boxes for needy families, but I put some back for long term storage, then kind of forgot about them.

I don't think they lasted 5 years. I was rearranging a food cabinet and came across them. I had to toss most of them due to leaking. The few that were intact I took into the kitchen, and had one every day for lunch until they were used up, just to keep from wasting them.

 

[Weedygarden]

Or donate 'em to the nearest homeless shelter, shelter for kids and/or abused women, etc. Folks in those shelters ain't gonna be too particular...

You would be surprised at how picky people can be. We have a few self serve pantry cabinets where you can drop off food and anyone can come help themselves. Grocery stores also donate day old bread and more to these places. Some even have refrigerators. There are people in groups asking for food for their families and saying all the food in the pantries has expired food. I know it isn't because I have donated to one, but maybe all the best by dated food gets left behind. We all know that there is a best by date, and the food does not necessarily "expire" on those dates, but for some people, it does. It is a mental idea for them. These people have never truly been hungry, starving. I know a man who as a teenager was abandoned by his family and he ate out of garbage bins.

 

[Wingnut]

I copy that, I starved as a youngster after my pop abandoned the family overseas, and we all lost heller weight... ever since, I've been down on waste, I always clean my plate or stash leftovers in the fridge. I remember working as a deckhand aboard an excursion boat on San Diego Bay, and there was SO MUCH food wasted in that operation. Large trash bags of perfectly good lunches and dinners would get tossed into a dumpster on the Embarcadero... whenever it was my turn to haul those bags to the dumpster, I'd look for homeless folks and tell 'em the food was perfectly good. No actual trash in the bags either, just food which the company couldn't be bothered to refrigerate. A colossal waste.

Edit: In Coronado, a big-time tourist trap, there were heaps of restaurants, so the food waste was pretty high there as well. That town always had a HUGE rat problem because the restaurants dumped so much food every night. Those rodents ate like kings, I tell ya, lol... if you're gonna be a rat, ya might as well be a rat in Coronado, since you'll never starve. It's sad to see such food waste though, particularly when folks are going hungry elsewhere. I think shelters & food pantries are good to have, even if some jackholes get all snooty about the food being one day past the expiration date, pfffffft. Over there in the poorer parts of Asia or Africa, they wouldn't be complaining...

 

[Rick]

Maybe start eating them now?

I've eaten some of them step by step.
but only when the pantry was empty, they are just too bland for my taste.

Sometimes if I put tons of parmesan cheese and garlic on them they become edible ..

 

[UrbanHunter]

I understand because of the acidic tomato content they are not really a long term prepping food , yes?
But they were on sale a couple years ago and I couldnt help myself.

I dont enjoy eating them and I bought them mostly as emergency food storage to supplement my more traditionally ( bagged sealed rice in buckets) prepper foods because they were

So now I have about 150 cans that are maybe 3.5 years old.

Thoughts?

Either eat them (lots of lunches) or find a poor family with kids in the area and donate them to them... you might make a friend. Or see check with a local church a see if they will give them to a needy family.

FYI: If I can't eat it, I'm not buying it. Eat what you store and store what you eat. I like their ravioli for a quick lunch in a pinch, but the wife can't have all that salt. I have a shelf full of quick lunch stuff for me that the wife finds sickening.....

 

[Magus]

My research says 5 years tops, BUT they will taste funky. I recommend making a couple of ravioli casseroles for your next church meeting/cook out, cornbread crust, covered in mozzarella cheese and mild pepper rings.

 

[Amish Heart]

Dogfood or chicken food. Don't know if cats would eat it. But dogfood is around a buck a can now. We have enough animals around here that everything gets eaten.

 

[Magus]

Cats won't touch it unless its one of my toms, if they see me eat it, they'll eat it.

 

[SheepDog]

High acid foods will rot the can before the food. If the can is in good shape you can likely safely eat the food.
I'm not against feeding it to chickens or cat's - they are disposable animals to me. Dogs are not disposable. They may give their life to protect my family but that makes them important.