Almost everyone treats the two dates on food packaging as the same thing. They are not.

A use-by date is about safety. A best-before date is about flavour. Obey both equally and you bin food that was fine — while trusting your nose on the foods where your nose cannot help you.

A 27-page audit of food dates, storage and spoilage, sourced to the agencies that set the rules.

Inside:

• In the US, the only food legally required to carry a date is infant formula. Everything else is a manufacturer’s estimate — and “Sell-By” was never addressed to you.

• Why the sniff test fails. Your nose detects spoilage, which is mostly harmless. It cannot detect the pathogens that make you ill — they have no smell.

• The fridge, properly understood: the Danger Zone, the two-hour rule, and why milk on the door is in the worst place.

• The freezer stops time. At −18 °C / 0 °F food stays safe indefinitely; only quality declines.

• Mould, food by food — what can be cut back an inch, and what has to go.

• Nine foods people get wrong: eggs, rice, bread, honey, tins, milk, dried goods, frozen veg, leftovers.

• A one-page summary for inside a cupboard door.

Every figure is sourced in an appendix — USDA FSIS, UK Food Standards Agency, UNEP Food Waste Index 2024.

A guide to labels and storage, not medical advice. Anyone pregnant, elderly, very young or immunocompromised should follow their own health service first.

27 pages. Instant PDF download.