Shelf Life & Expiry Dates

How long can you keep milk in the refrigerator? Is it still drinkable or do you have to throw out that milk carton? Can you save money by using products that are past their expiry dates? What do terms such as "sell by," "use by," "best by," really mean? What does a frugal person do with products that happen to be past the "used by," "best by," etc. dates?

Here is a roundup of useful resources to explain the confusing jargon that manufacturers use and the expiry dates of most products:

• Shelf Life Advice
  A very useful site to find out the shelf life of a particular product. Enter product in search box to find out its shelf life and storage information.
  
  
• Food Expiration Dates: What Do They Really Mean? (Yahoo Green)
  
  
• Expiration Dates (OrganizeYourLife.org).
  A near-exhaustive and very useful list of how long you can keep food, household, beauty and cosmetic products.
  


• Do Food Expiry Dates Really Matter? (WebMD.com)
  An informative discussion about the confusing mix of terms used by manufacturers on their products.
  


• The Secret Code of Beer Expiration Dates (Consumerist.com).
  How to decode the mysterious codes that breweries use on to indicate how old your beer is.