h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I have a bottle of Thai Fish Sauce with the best before date of October 2008. It smells pretty much as horrible as when I first bought it.

Does the stuff go off? Is it still safe to eat?

B

When did you buy it?

I usually reckon that if the stuff has a best by date 10 years in the future, an extra year won't harm you. If it has a best by date 10 days in the future, another day won't harm you.

Has it been opened? Dunno about fish sauce but I had some oyster sauce that was most definately 'off' Mind I think that was my fault for not having secured the lid quite right

Interesting question, how does something that's essentially off in the first place go off?

I'd probably still use it.

Interesting conversation here...
http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/358767

'fish sauce is like herpes...'

'when the world is done, all that will be left is cockroaches and fish sauce'

Oyster sauce is nothing like fish sauce. Fish sauce is essentially the thai equivalent of salt.

I'm now wondering how long shrimp paste lasts as I've a tub of that in the fridge that I'm sure I haven't used in at least a year. I stopped bothering to make my own thai curry pastes and there the use of it ended.

I'm guessing it'll be alright. The broth recipe I have for tonight calls for 4tbsp of it, though, which might be more than my stomach can take. I'll split it 50/50 with soy sauce I think, and then get rid of the bottle.

B

Mu Beta is dead and gone
You'll never see him more
For what he thought was NaCl
Was Thai fish sauce that was beyond its sell-by date

Hmm. Needs work.

RF

4 tbsp does sound like an awful lot - unless it's for about 6L of broth.

I once followed a chinese recipe calling for that much and - lo and behold - it was inedible until I'd added about 4 tbsp of sugar to compensate.

I still can't see a conversation about fish sauce without chuckling quietly about the time I accidentally smashed a litre bottle of it in the gents loos at the Vue cinema in Cardiff and bravely did a complete runner.

Nice...I think I remember that one on your journal.

I'm going for 1tbsp of fish sauce and 1tbsp of soy. The recipe does call for 2tsp of sugar as well. That should be enough for anyone.

B

MuBeta is on the slab:
an unappealing stiff.
Like the fishy broth that saw him off
you can tell so by the whiff.

Wished I'd read this last week. I threw away a bottle out of date by a year.

I had a feeling it would be OK but had a 'new' one (only nearly out of date) so used that one instead.

Ooo thought it may be kinda* simular to oyster sauce... don't think I've ever cooked with fish sauce...
At least I'm pretty safe this evening with a two and a bit hour cooked stew... well if I manage to wait that long before serving it up anyhows

If it's past 'Best before' it won't kill you but may not taste at its best (and if it's an egg, it may smell horrendous).

If it's past its 'Use by', you're supposed to throw it away (and practise better ingredient management, according to our finger-wagging lawmakers who invented the whole caboodle in the first place). I don't always; yoghurt, for example, is made from manky milk in the first place. And it's not as if on the stroke of midnight on the day of the use-by date it suddenly becomes poisonous.

I have an unopened jar of tumeric 'Best before' 1998 if anybody needs some.

And I'm sure my mother still has some herbs in jars priced in shillings and pence ...

Mol

Turmeric is a very powerful antiseptic, so I wouldn't worry too much about that being dangerous to eat.

No ill-effects thus far from the fish sauce. Although I think I may go out and dispose of the rest of the bottle in a dustbin tomorrow. It's a 750ml bottle, fer chrissakes! Who needs THAT much fish sauce?

B

The ?

Hmmm, isn't some of the ancient Roman fish sauce still around?