My freshly-bought 'eat by date' fetish
My friends and family back home in India have noticed my new-embedded "dating" tendency, and are exasperated no end.
Published: Fri 17 Jun 2016, 1:36 PM
Ever since I moved to Dubai, I realise I notice the 'use by date' or 'best before' caveat much more than I did when I was in India. Maybe it has to do with the fact that, here, even fresh fruits and veggies are all accorded an 'expiry date' on the little stamp that carries the price tag (I bought the sprouts the other day, and I need to wrap them up in a week's time. I'm already in panic mode). I say "even" simply because, in India, I bought my fruits/veggies from the open market or mobile vendors - and obviously there was no system of having expiry dates printed on those packages.
It's probably a conditioning mechanism: this need to consume something that's as fresh as can be; and, now, I think I go a bit mental checking cans and bottles for birth and death dates. If there's a can of tuna that claims it's best used by July 2017 lying next to one with a 'best by date' of November 2016 (and I know I will be making a lot of tuna sandwiches in a couple of hours, so the can will be emptied in any case, and I don't really need to stretch my imagination), I'll invariably snag the 2017 one. I had a semi-fight with a more conscientious friend who felt I should pick up the one with the shorter shelf life - because that's the right thing to do. "You're helping the old guy here, don't you see?"
I didn't. Okay, maybe I did, but I didn't care.
It's come to a point where I don't feel comfortable having 24-hour-old cooked food stocked securely in a well-functioning refrigerator. I have an aunt (in India) who insists on binning all leftover food from lunch and dinner (she tries her very best to prepare the "perfect quantity" every time so NO leftovers accrue, but there can't be a perfect quantity EVERY TIME, so, yes, there are leftovers. at times). We all used to laugh at her once upon a time; but, these days, I don't like it when others laugh at me (because it seems I'm just like the aunt we all used to laugh at) for being paranoid as well as a wastrel.
Bread is perhaps the winner. When I am buying bread, I laboriously peer at the fine print (without my reading glasses) in an effort to try and catch the packaging date, and always, always ensure to buy a loaf that has popped out of the oven to see the light of day that very day itself.
My friends and family back home in India have noticed my new-embedded "dating" tendency, and are exasperated no end. I was trying to buy bread at Delhi's Khan Market with a friend at 10am, and I spent an unseemly amount of time finding a store that had a loaf baked that morning. "What's with you?" my friend suddenly lost his temper (he had to give his car for servicing at 10.30am). "Just get yesterday's bread."
"How can I get yesterday's bread? That's stale. I want bread that's been baked today. Oven fresh."
My friend left in a huff, asking me to hail a cab and fend for myself from thereon. Undeterred, I (triumphantly) came across a lovely Delhi deli that was just getting its day's supply of the wholemeal stuff.
But actually, I don't have to be so nit-picky. If you do a search on that great demystification engine known as Google, you'll find bread comes with a rather prolonged longevity. It remains good to eat for the next five to six days at least. What's more, most sites proclaim that you can keep bread refrigerated for days on end, and as long as they don't turn mouldy or smell "odd", they're perfectly edible. So why do I insist on buying out-of-the-oven bread even when there are several slices from a two-day-old loaf tucked in my fridge? I really don't know.
The other day I was throwing away a half-eaten jar of cream cheese because it had run out of time - knowing fully well that eatbydate.com advocates, "cream cheese will last for about 3-4 weeks longer than any 'best by' date printed on the package".
Do I feel guilty? Yes, as guilty as sin.
sushmita@khaleejtimes.com
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