Purchased RIbs, are they still good?


 
G

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I fired up smoker last weekend and bought Costco Cryo-sealed baby-backs. I used most of them and they turned out great. However. I opned two packages (4 ribs total) and applied the dry rub thinking I would cook them but wound up not cooking them...... They are still in fridge with rub on them. The sell by date while in package was the 21st. I want to smoke them either Thu or Fri. think they will still be good?
THANKS>
 
K C:

You will probably be okay on the ribs. But to be safe I would wrap them and put them in the freezer today. Fresh pork only has about a weeks shelf life after exposed to air. The date you saw on the package was before the seal was broken.
 
Sell-by dates mean very little when it comes to meats. Still, once the cryo is opened new dynamics come into play. Safety isn't a concern here since the ribs are fridged; it's a quality issue--spoilage, specifically.

The other issue here is holding ribs that long with rub on them and the issue with that is the ribs becoming hammy with all that salt and sugar on them. (That is why I do not rub more than 10 min in advance of cooking.) Can you cook them sooner? I'd certainly try. If not, you can freeze but when thawing expect the rub to be very moist/mushy. It'll cook though.
 
Sell-by dates are fairly immaterial when it comes to meats unless you happen to be somewhere where they are actually regulated at a local level. I ignore them. They can vary--and do--by store policy, company policy, or by whim as nothing governs them. Pretty useless unless you are certain that your store or its company policy is thinking of you first. Highly doubtful.

What you want to know is the 'pack date'. This date is stamped on the case the meat was packed in at packing house--and is required by law. Except for infant formulas and dairy products, there are no Fed requirements for expiration, sell-by, or use-by dates on foods.

Sell-by dates have nothing necessarily to do with food safety nor, often, quality. Sell-bys on meats can be arbitrary; pack dates are not.
 
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