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A bonus Can I eat this? question! (Okay, more accurately, it’s a What the hell did I eat? question, but let’s not quibble.) The case of the boozy backpack quinoa has lurked queasily in my mind since I read it back in February.
… [I] discover the container of food in my backpack, where it’s been sitting for a couple of days in a fairly warm environment. I chow it all down, noting that it tastes – and smells – funky. Sour, bitter, but not altogether bad. Additionally, the zucchini slices look and taste more like pickle slices.
It’s 30 minutes later now, and I swear to God I have a little bit of a buzz on.
Blarf!
Knowing that I’d missed at least one Can I eat this? question posed to AskMe, I scoured the archives… and found even more than before:
meat
- Freezer fiasco
- “Sell-Before” Sauerbraten
- highly suspect pork
- lots of suspect pork!
- Another crockpot/chicken question
- Spam from the trunk of a car
starches
- five-day-old pizza dough
- refreezing thawed hash browns and fries
- overnight rice
a nice puttanesca, perhaps?
- pasta, canned sauce, and canned fish, all past their “Best Before” dates
miscellaneous
- backpack Velveeta and cupboard Colby
- The positively Biblical-sounding honey from a fallen hive
- 13-year-old triple bock
- Why must I cook Patak’s curry paste?
really miscellaneous
- I can’t stop eating sand.
fizzy
- fizzy tomato sauce
- fizzy salad dressing
- fermented applesauce
explosive?
- Kulfi: explosive, poisonous, both, or neither?
putatively healthful
- Is this health drink harmful?
a splash of color
- Why has my garlic gone blue?
- Wait — why has my garlic turned blue?
- Okay, then, why has my garlic turned fluorescent green?
- Why is my coconut milk blue?
I am participating in NaBloPoMo.
The hive mind at Ask Metafilter draws on a pool of 60,000 members to answer questions on any topic: romantic, technical, medical, cultural. But perhaps the most entertaining discourse, second only to Steve, Don’t Eat It!, occurs in the wake of the question “Is this safe to eat?” Here I present a compilation of food safety questions from AskMe. Goggle in amazement as people take chances with:
eggs
- “How long will scrambled eggs keep?”
- “I hard-boiled a dozen eggs this morning. They’ve been sitting in the same water they boiled in which is now at room temperature (about 20C/70F) for approximately six to eight hours.“
- “The ice cream made with this maybe-undercooked custard is in the mixer right now.”
poultry
- “… today I learned that you’re very much not supposed to store raw veg & raw chicken together in the fridge overnight, and now I know better than to do it again. But…“
- “ XMAS DINNER: Is it safe to eat these leftovers?” [I would totally eat these, and very recently did eat turkey & stuffing similarly mistreated.]
- “Pizza [topped with chicken] purchased hot on Wednesday night and kept in the fridge till Friday….Good to eat?”
- “Should I eat this cooked chicken in my fridge? 6-7 days old, and in a zip-loc.”
- “I left a [chicken patty with mayo] sandwich in my car this morning, unfortunately on the back deck (sedan).”
fish and shellfish!
- “I made a tuna sandwich for lunch and left it at home [on the counter]. Will it still be edible?”
- “How long is it safe to keep cooked shrimp in a refrigerator before eating?”
- “Erm, I just ate raw swordfish… Am I gonna die?”
- “I just found some frozen scallops in the back of my refrigerator, and I imagine they have been there for about two years.”
preserved pork
- “Is it OK to eat raw pancetta? It tasted good, but it was very, very chewy, so chewy that I ended up having an unchewable lump of fat in my mouth that I had to spit out.”
the savory course
- “ How long does Chevre keep?“
- “I left my cheese out overnight. Is it still okay to eat?”
- “Mmm, walnuts. Hey, what’s that cobweb stuff?“
- “This wine’s cork has gritty brown crystal and organic matter on the bottom. What is that? Is it bad?”
taters and tomaters
- “If I remove the sprouts, are these potatoes safe to eat?“
- ” ‘Refrigerate after opening,’ says the tomato sauce. Unfortunately, it wasn’t.“
potential botulinum carriers
- “Would homemade mango chutney which was placed in a strawberry jam jar as soon as it was made and hasn’t been opened since (as far as I know) still be OK to eat after one year in a pantry cupboard at room temperature?“
- “Why did my hummus explode?” After being advised that exploding hummus may well indicate botulism, which produces no off smell or taste and can easily be deadly or debilitating, the original poster adds “It totally smells fine. I have yet to decide about eating it.”
And finally, my two favorites. One, a simple question seeking an inventive answer:
- “Can I eat a live wasp? If so, what would the safest method of eating it?”
Second, a long dramatic arc detailing the struggle between financial prudence and every other kind of prudence:
- “But hey, this is expensive crab meat.“
I am participating in NaBloPoMo.
Elli
Elsa
