Many people are surprised to learn that those expiration dates on the bottom of canned foods don’t really mean what they thought. In fact, my article about canned food expiration dates is one of the most viewed articles, out of over 1,500 articles on the entire site. Looking at those views made me realize something. People are also told that they can only freeze food for a certain period of time before it must be thrown out. Is expired frozen food safe to eat? What happens if you eat it? Do frozen foods expire at all?
See also: What is Fresh Frozen Food?
Do Frozen Foods Expire?
Frozen foods do not expire as long as they are kept at a minimum temperature (-18° C / 0° F). Most packaged frozen foods will bear a best-by date, but not an actual expiration date. Of course, this is only true if the food is kept constantly frozen. If food is allowed to thaw and reach a temperature above 40°F (4.5°C), bacteria can start to grow, and other changes can take place in the food, affecting its safety, taste, and texture, even if the food is refrozen. See Safe Temperatures for Foods.
Safety of Expired Frozen Foods
FoodSafety.gov, from the U.S Department of Human Resources, provides a guide to Storage Times for the Refrigerator and Freezer. The times given for the refrigerator should be taken seriously. However, many people providing this information elsewhere tend to miss what the site has to say about the storage times given for the freezer:
The guidelines for freezer storage are for quality only. Frozen foods constantly stored at 0°F or below can be kept indefinitely.
That’s right. Foods stored in the freezer remain safe almost indefinitely. And, even if they are not actually stored as low as 0° F or below, they will still last much longer than the suggested times. Around -18° C, or just about 0° F, is what most household freezers are set to, as this is the basis of the expiration dates on many frozen foods. This is also the temperature used in restaurants and supermarkets, although supermarkets often fail to keep frozen food at this temperature consistently. Freezer temperature adjustment dials don’t usually provide actual temperatures, so if you are not sure what temp your freezer is set to, consult your owner’s manual.
So, if you keep that pack of hot dogs in the freezer for longer than one to two months, the hot dogs will still be perfectly safe to eat. However, their quality may be compromised, meaning they may not taste as good or have the right texture. If freezer burn has set in, they may look bad, but they will still be perfectly safe. All the freezer times given on the site FoodSafety.gov site are for quality purposes only.
The better you wrap a food for freezer storage, the longer its quality can be maintained. No matter how well a food is stored, however, it cannot be kept at peak quality forever. But if you absolutely have nothing to eat, you can feel quite safe in eating that frost-covered freezer-burned pork chop or steak that you forgot about two years ago. It may not taste very good, but it won’t hurt you.
For longterm storage of frozen foods, the freezer in your refrigerator/freezer combo is not the best choice. For very longterm storage, the deep freezer is best, as I explained in my article about freezer burn, linked above. There, I also give some tips for wrapping meats for longer storage.
