> Yesterday I made a can of Campbell's Minestrone, and it wasn't until I was
> cleaning up that I noticed it had "expired" in 2005.

I'm sure we've all eaten expired food, knowingly and not. I've got some MRE substitutes that I've kept past the date and tried it along - I wasn't willing to eat it a year past the expiration date because of texture and flavor problems. Nice to know information for when we in the San Francisco Bay Area have our Big One, and that was the reason for the experiment.

I will also say it depends significantly on storage. I used to live in an apartment that had been converted by the owner from a two-story house to two apartments, and he ran the chimney from the oil burner in the basement through the kitchen pantry. In the winter, it got very hot in there, and canned goods did not last through the winter - some of them swelled up noticeably, and we threw them away unopened. If you're storing canned goods in a closed area in the hot summer sun, you may have more problems than if you store them in a cellar on the shady side of the house.

Campbell's soups have so much salt in them that they will probably last forever.

Sue

So will the corpse from all the salt

Interesting Biblical quotation at the LDS Prep Manual site: "The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it. Proverbs 27:12"

Looking at it from a slightly different angle, it could be referring to lost hikers that don't have the common sense to stop when they realize they're lost, but just keep going and get themselves into worse trouble.

Sue

This particular can of minestrone went from Tucson summer heat to New Mexico below zero winters to Pasadena >100 last summer.

So it definitely hit all of the extremes in a forgotton drawer of the RV.

I just found a can of ShurFine Cream Of Broccoli that "expired" in 2003, so after I try it, if you all never see my Buffalo again, remember me with fondness, please.

Ha Ha. While it might taste a bit worse for wear, I wouldn't be surprised if it was fine to eat in time need.

I have eaten C-rats that are 30 years old. Still okay.

...'course it wasn't CREAM of broccoli.

I just threw out several C-rats that I got in the late '70's, black stuff oozing from the cans...

Yes, nowadays C-rats are not considered edible nor are they sold as such.

...C-rats are not considered edible..."

I NEVER considered C's edible

OBG--i sort of had a taste for the eggs and chopped ham..
someplace around the house i have one of those little flat cans of peanut butter..i always ate the crackers dry and saved the peanut butter for a snack--