Scott Nash, a Maryland local who strongly believes against expiry dates on food products decided to take a stance against it, and prove the world wrong by performing a year long self-experiment.

Nash, a passionate environmentalist, was inspired to take on this rather unheard of experiment a few years ago after eating a yogurt that was already half a year past the expiry date.  After realizing that he had forgotten about it, he couldn’t bring himself to waste food, and in fact ended up eating it without experiencing any kind of unusual symptoms afterwards. Nash even claims that there was nothing wrong with the taste. 

This successful expired yogurt experience had Nash start to question the ways in which expiry dates are used, and the very vague terms that are written on products that lack consistency, such as sell by or best by. What do these terms even really mean? Do anyone of us even know exactly? 

With all things being said, Nash decided to eat only foods that had passed their expiry date for an entire year together with his family (somehow he got them to agree). They ate everything you can possibly imagine that had gone bad months before, including bread, butter with mold, and heavy cream.  

Nash does thankfully realize that certain foods must be thrown away – however he believes that there are more accurate methods of checking rather than the standard expiration date – expressing that the taste or smell should be the real determining factor.

However, the fact that most people throw out products that are an still in an edible state needs to stop, according to Nash. Believe it or not, researchers and those in the grocery manufacturing industry actually do agree that food waste can be reduced by making packages more clearly labeled. 

At the same time however, there is no law that enforces expiration dates to be made more clear, allowing companies to label products as they please at the moment.