Damaged canned goods

[booger]

I found a food "surplus" store in a nearby town and checked it out yesterday. They had some pretty good buys (nothing exceptional) but couldn't remember what the safety rules are for damaged canned goods.

I know bulging cans are baaad. They didn't have any.

Rusted cans--how rusted is bad?

Dented cans--what about these? They had many, many dented cans.

I just bought a few boxed foods and some undented canned goods for now but will definitely be going back. Oh, they had gallon-sized cans of corned beef hash and chili for $5. WalMart sells them for $9.95 so I bought one of each to see if we like the unknown brand. They also had those little meal bars for 25 cents each. They were huge, though! A lot of good stock-up foods in there.

 

[sally]

Booger:

I would not buy any damaged cans. It's just not worth the risk. You can probably sort through and fine ones in good shape. If a lot are rusty, they are probably from an old stock and may be at the end of their life.

Sally

 

[Dinghy]

I have been to one of these stores too. I only will buy slightly dented cans now. I had some cranberry sauce that I got for .25 a can and thought it was a really good deal. They had pretty good dents in them. A year later some of the cans had leaked. The labels were all sticky, but I couldn't tell where they leaked from. I opened up a couple cans, and they definitely weren't good. The few with small dents are still ok. I'm thinking that maybe because that is more acid than other foods that it ate through a weak spot in the dents. I won't take that chance again. The store raised it's prices a few months after opening, and I haven't been back. The women were sitting there with flyers from the local grocery stores and complaining about how much more the stores got for the same items. I would have thought they knew that before they went into business!!

 

[Pogonip]

I've worked on a lot of food drives, and in food banks--we would keep slightly dented cans, but deeply or -sharply- dented cans were tossed. Minute holes can form at the sharpest angle of the dent, causing spoilage.

Lightly rusted cans are usually ok, just means they've been in a humid location, but we would not give out badly rusted cans, though I've never had a problem with them, so long as there's no sign of leakage or stained labels.

We'd starve without our local "used food" store--they usually stock overruns, or cans with incorrect labelling, or a run that may be shy of stated weight. But I avoid another "used food" store that consistently stocks dented cans and out-of-date foods--too many things I got from them tasted stale.

Foods that blew fastest in our food lockers were pumpkin, sauerkraut, lima beans, beets, tomato paste, and tomato sauce. ~Any~ can that the lid gave on slightly was tossed--that top should be -tight-. Our rule was, if -we- wouldn't want to take it home, don't give it to people...a rule not followed by our -donors- sometimes.

Pogonip, who can spot a blown can at a hundred yards....

 

[rhughe13]

My local Po Gro has a good deal on packaged beef ( 1 lb.) and chili with beef ( 1 lb.) for a dollar. They were packaged like a lean cuisine and had expiry dates of 12/06. No refrigeration required.

The good part is that they were all natural, with no partially hydroginated oils, no MSG or MSG look alikes, and no artificial flavorings/colors. They weren't scratch and dents either.

I have already tasted the chili and it was surprisingly good.

I'm stocking these for preps.

 

[booger]

Thanks! I've always been overly paranoid about foodstuffs so I needed a reality check. Looks like I'm not so overly paranoid afterall.