I have some bacon I took out of the freezer and put directly into the fridge to use this past weekend. Unfortunately, the weekend came and went without me cooking said bacon. It has been sitting in my fridge about 6 days in its unopened vacuum pack. The package says it is best by July 30 of this year (so another ~8 days).
Normally this would be the end of the story, but I once read that freezing cured meats actually lowers their shelf life and can lead to them becoming rancid quicker. Further, this pamphlet from the USDA states that bacon is only good up to 7 days in the fridge anyway. My question: should I go with the package date and use it within the next week or should I toss it and buy more?
Best Answer
To quote from your own source:
And, further up:
Let's look at what happens when you freeze food:
Due to the low temperatures, the growth of all1 molds, bacteria and other "nasties" is stopped or at least slowed down to an extremely slow rate. So from the perspective of your food, time is suspended while frozen. (Quality issues left aside, we are talking food safety here.)
So the clock starts ticking again once you defrost your food and can be stopped when re-freezing. Taking into account that your bacon was supposed to be good until the end of the month and freezing doesn't shorten that time, you should be fine at least until the original best-by-date.
In theory you could calculate
But that's based on estimated bacterial growth, not taking possible quality issues into account - and we shouldn't always go to the limit, should we?.
1 "all" as in "all typical pathogens". Of course there are bacteria that thrive on ice, but those are not relevant here.