Solving the Food Expiration Problem
By Bri L
You buy your items at the store and after you store them away you either forget about them completely or forget long enough that they expire. Then you have to throw these items out and you waste money. To start you should go through the items you already have and check all of their dates.
Here are some helpful ways to find out if your food items have gone bad besides by the expiration date. Items that are considered dairy such as milk, eggs, yogurt, and sour cream expire quickly while other dairy products such as cheese and butter last much longer. They may have gone bad it will not harm you to have them. For canned items look at the shape of the can. If it has changed the product has most likely gone bad. For boxed items such as cereal, you can tell if it has gone bad by the stale taste it will have. To tell if fruit or vegetable items have gone bad it is best to use smell and inspect them.
I have a few more solutions below:
Make a meal plan. So I know it can be difficult but this will save you a lot of time, money, and it is easier to stay on a healthy diet. Now I mention meal planning multiple times on my website because it is so important!. Remember to stay healthy with your meals and you can find them on Pinterest, a website where you can search very specifically such as "easy crockpot meal" or "healthy breakfast snack" and it will give you hundreds of options for recipes. Once you put this in your Sunday night routine it can be easy to do.
Keep a list. After you have done your grocery shopping or hopefully you have received your delivery, as you are putting your items away make a list of things that expire. Another good idea on your list is to add when you made your meals so you can try to eat your leftovers within a week. Put this list somewhere you will see it. As you use items you can cross them off. I suggest making this list after every trip to the grocery store for best results.
Grab your sharpie. If you do not like the list idea this can be helpful in knowing when things expire. As your putting your items away label with a sharpie your items with the date they expire. The expiration date can be small and difficult to read. You should make sure that when you write on the item the date is facing the front so you actually see it when you open the fridge. On your Tupperware, you can write the date of when you made the meal and it will watch off in the dishwasher after a few washes if you feel comfortable with that. I hope these solutions help!
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Article Source: Solving the Food Expiration Problem