Can I still eat it: Raw chicken, still sealed?

May 14, 2023 10:56 AM

I'm not very experienced in the kitchen but trying to cook more. I have sealed chicken thighs in trays unopened bought 6 days ago, shows expiring May 17th. Can I still eat it?

It's within expiry date but it will be now a a week in the fridge at home so I'm reading some conflicting information about open / unopened about how long raw chicken can sit in the fridge before consuming.

posted by artificialard to Food & Drink (19 answers total)

As long as it’s been in the fridge the whole time, I’d eat it.
posted by kevinbelt at 11:08 AM on May 14, 2023 [2 favorites]

Depends on the temperature of the fridge and how long it was out of the fridge while in transit. It should be okay, and barring any signs of decay I would eat it. There is always a chance that it was at warm enough temperature at some point long enough for bad bacteria to grow. Of course there is always a change it stood out on the counter too long in the butcher department while being processed and packed or before being put into the meat cooler after it was packed. You can't ever rule that out with meat.

I have never had a problem with meat in the condition you describe. Cold enough to make your hands cold when you handle it, no off smell, slime, or change of colour? As close to safe as you can get.
posted by Jane the Brown at 11:09 AM on May 14, 2023

Best answer: For ANY food, if it’s still sealed and has been refrigerated the entire time, it’s safe to eat at least until the expiry date. That’s what the expiry date means. So yes you can eat the chicken.

(Obviously there are exceptions in the case of obvious spoilage but that doesn’t sound like the case here.)
posted by mekily at 11:22 AM on May 14, 2023 [12 favorites]

Assuming your fridge is working properly and it didn’t sit out for a significant length of time while you transported it, there’s really no difference between it sitting in your fridge and sitting in the store—where they would still be selling it today, if you hadn’t bought it.
posted by staggernation at 11:23 AM on May 14, 2023 [3 favorites]

Yesterday I cooked and ate chicken that had been in the fridge for a week and expired on the 13th. It had been refrigerated the entire time. A little of the surface that had been touching the plastic was actually a little dried out, but it looked and smelled fine and it was still within the expiration period. It has now been 24 hours since I ate it, I'm fine, it tasted good.

I always remind myself that people age meat on purpose, like "hanging" game at 30-40 degrees for days or letting poultry sit uncovered in the fridge to dry the skin. People have survived for centuries and centuries without refrigeration - this doesn't mean that one blithely ignores food safety rules, but it does mean that things don't go bad quite so fast as our modern-food-storage anxieties tell us they do.
posted by Frowner at 11:27 AM on May 14, 2023 [1 favorite]

That’s what the expiry date means.

That's what people think it means. But expiry dates are as full of shit as American meats.
posted by flabdablet at 11:31 AM on May 14, 2023 [3 favorites]

One more vote for eating it.

But: cook it well. This isn't about your specific chicken, it is about all chicken. Unfortunately, a lot of chicken is not cooked through, and people get sick from it. Thighs are specially tricky. I would cook them in a stew-type dish rather than fry or roast them. I found this recipe by googling, it is very close to what I would improvise. Cooking the thighs this way, and serving with rice, couscous, polenta or good bread would even make your meal cheaper and healthier.
posted by mumimor at 11:40 AM on May 14, 2023 [3 favorites]

expiry dates are as full of shit

Well, yes, this is also true — but the point is that expiry dates are overly conservative. So if a food is past its expiry date, that doesn’t mean it’s spoiled, but if a food hasn’t passed its expiry date yet, it’s almost definitely safe to eat.
posted by mekily at 11:50 AM on May 14, 2023 [6 favorites]

I thought it's supposed to say "Best Before", not Expiry Date". Anyway if it hasn't been out of the fridge, and in good temprature, it should be ok. ADDED:Or you can go with not taking a chance since chicken ....salmonella.
posted by amfgf at 12:17 PM on May 14, 2023

If it doesn't smell bad, look green or feel slimy it should be fine.
posted by essexjan at 12:36 PM on May 14, 2023

Cooking will kill salmonella, which is why I commented above. Food is not dangerous, but you need to know food rules. My grandmother didn't know the science of food, but she had it drilled into her to bleach the cutting board and cook poultry through.
In her generation, chickens and other poultry were close to home. She knew why one shouldn't eat raw chicken. Our food comes from somewhere we never visit and don't know about, so we have to learn from theory, rather than practice.

Because this is old knowledge, there are tons of ways to use a pack of chicken thighs you can find online. They are really good value. Get cooking. You can also grill, roast or fry them, the reason I advised against it above is that those are the riskiest options for a new cook.
posted by mumimor at 12:36 PM on May 14, 2023

Best answer: I'm not very experienced in the kitchen ... it will be now a a week in the fridge at home

I'd eat it.

Let me share some kitchen experience with you, though. When I bring a tray of chicken thigh fillets home, it goes straight in the freezer. A sealed tray of thigh fillets will keep for months in the freezer without perceptible deterioration, and even after all that time it will be about as food-safe as it was on the day it first went in.

Quite a lot of the things I use thigh fillets for need them cut into strips before being cooked. This process is way easier if I only half-thaw them, which I do by putting the whole frozen tray in the microwave for a few minutes.

You want them still stuck together as a single frosty slab on the cutting board, just not one that's so rock-hard the knife won't go through it. Handling and slicing one firm slab of partially frozen meat is way faster and easier than dealing with a dozen squishy slippery stretchy individual fillets, and also leaves way less mess on the cutting board so it's easier to clean.

They finish thawing properly quite quickly after they're sliced up. If I do them first, they're usually plenty thawed enough by the time I've prepped whatever else I'm cooking them with but if they're still a little frosty when they start to cook, extend the cooking time a little. Just double-check they're not still pink in the middle once you think they're done.
posted by flabdablet at 12:43 PM on May 14, 2023 [5 favorites]

Yes, you can eat it. Perhaps this will ease your worries: if you bought this chicken today from a grocery store, you wouldn't think twice about it - your fridge is really no different. Food post-processing sits around in refrigerated storage, trucks, and stores way more than we might imagine.
posted by coffeecat at 1:57 PM on May 14, 2023 [2 favorites]

> Cooking will kill salmonella

Yes, but it's worth noting (which this omits to mention) that any toxins that the salmonella produced are not generally destroyed by cooking. So although the bacteria are gone the food may still make one sick.

I'd eat the chicken that's in question though, if it smelled ok and wasn't obviously off.
posted by anadem at 2:31 PM on May 14, 2023 [1 favorite]

There are also packaging differences sometimes between different dates - I've bought some meat recently that had been vacuum sealed or otherwise treated differently and had expiration dates like, six weeks out from when I bought it. Obviously not the same as "I used half of this (and handled the other half before putting it back in my fridge), how many days is it good"
posted by Lady Li at 3:03 PM on May 14, 2023

My chicken rule of thumb: If it doesn't smell, eat it. If it smells a little, marinate it and cook it and eat it. If it smells bad - and you will know it - toss it.
posted by zaelic at 1:39 AM on May 15, 2023

Yes, this chicken should be safe to eat.

What would be the difference between the chicken sitting in the fridge at the store until the 16th, or sitting in your refrigerator until the 16th?
posted by kinddieserzeit at 4:54 AM on May 15, 2023

If it's still in date, I'd eat it, but do be sure to cook it well (165 degrees F), and soon.

Ignore anyone that says they rely on smell or appearance to determine whether it's spoiled or not. Neither is a reliable indicator of whether a food has been spoiled by pathogen growth. As others have mentioned, cooking can't kill toxins that pathogens may leave behind either.
posted by Aleyn at 7:58 PM on May 15, 2023

Response by poster: Just an update that I ate it last night and feel fine, success! I grew up in a family that realllly liked to stretch the boundaries of food spoilage/safety consequently making me overcautious so appreciate the validation.

And if anyone is learning to cook and meal prepping, chicken thighs are incredibly forgiving - the high fat content comes with a lot of flavor already, and can/should be baked longer as well as reheated without drying out like breasts.

As an aside I've been part of this site for over a decade, this is the most engagement I've ever gotten (though admittedly I'm a rare poster). I
posted by artificialard at 7:26 PM on May 17, 2023