Should I Eat This: Ultra-Pasteurized Milk

March 27, 2020 3:34 PM

Unopened (sealed) quart of milk got left on the counter sometime today and was out for a maximum of eight hours. It now seems to be room temperature. Best by date of 5/18. Ultra-pasteurized, but the kind that stays refrigerated at the store, not the shelf-stable kind. Can I drink it? Normally I’d toss and replace, but I just went the the store and probably won’t go to the store for at least another week.
posted by a box and a stick and a string and a bear to Food & Drink (13 answers total)

My guess is it's probably ok now, but will spoil much faster than it would've otherwise.
posted by jon1270 at 3:44 PM on March 27, 2020 [2 favorites]

Since it’s still sealed, it’s probably fine, but smell it before you drink it.
posted by Night_owl at 3:48 PM on March 27, 2020 [2 favorites]

It's fine.
posted by lauranesson at 4:03 PM on March 27, 2020 [1 favorite]

There's no difference between the UHT milk in the fridge case and the UHT milk on the regular shelves, they just put it there because Americans are weirded out by room temperature milk.
posted by yeahlikethat at 4:15 PM on March 27, 2020 [20 favorites]

Honestly, I personally would keep and use this milk even if it wasn’t UHT pasteurized.
posted by obfuscation at 4:29 PM on March 27, 2020 [7 favorites]

I'd try to use it today to make yogurt or pudding or protein shakes or something.
posted by bink at 4:29 PM on March 27, 2020

We inherited a bunch of out of date UHT milk and have been drinking it for over a year and a half. It does spoil faster than otherwise like jon1270 said, but we've suffered no ill effects from drinking it.
posted by mkdirusername at 4:59 PM on March 27, 2020

Milk is not shy about telling you when it’s bad. If it does not speak to you (via smell or taste) you’re fine!
posted by kapers at 5:14 PM on March 27, 2020 [3 favorites]

UHT and ultra-pasteurized are two different things. This is not shelf-stable milk. I would not drink it.
posted by corey flood at 6:45 PM on March 27, 2020 [3 favorites]

Force a significant other to smell it. Taste it. TASTE IT! Does it taste funny? No? I think it smells funny. It does! I don't care if you think it's fine. You eat things you dropped on the floor. I'm throwing it out.

Honey we're out of milk, can you go to the store?
posted by some little punk in a rocket at 7:08 PM on March 27, 2020 [3 favorites]

Just toss it. This isn’t a great time to give yourself a case of food poisoning over a $2 quart of milk.
posted by Autumnheart at 7:20 PM on March 27, 2020

If it does go off a bit more quickly, you can always bake with sour milk.
posted by toastedcheese at 8:50 PM on March 27, 2020

Seconding kapers: try it. You will absolutely know if it's off, possibly even before it hits your lips. The unexpected-spoiled-milk sense in humans is very strong. If it is off, it's unlikely to do much harm even if you ingest it.
posted by scruss at 6:11 AM on March 28, 2020