Unlearning what we had learned - 2

Take fresh meat for example. Meat, goes bad after a while, that is true. But did you know that the best cuts of the most expensive beef (and I'm talking about the +$100 steaks) MUST be aged for no less than 27 days? When the expiration date at the grocery store says 2 days. Of course, "Aged", is a delicate "process" that requires certain conditions.

As a rule of thumb,  if you keep moisture and heat away from anything. They can last a lot longer. Just look at dried fruits, sun dried tomatoes, and dried mushrooms. These could stay edible for a very long time. Years. Possible tens of years. Perhaps even hundreds of years as the combination of low moisture, and high concentration of sugars acts as a natural preservative.

Again, we're assuming here that no pest has found its way to products being preserved.

There is pickling. Where food is preserved for a considerably long time due to the high concentration of salts, vinegar and spices that act as a natural anti-bacterial. Keeping the food from going bad. All while altering it's characteristics. In fact, making it better sometimes. Just think, what's better the cucumber raw or pickled? Both are good, but I'm sure some people prefer it pickled.

For many manufacturers, the expiration date has morphed to a "best by" or "consume before" where they know certain foods retain it's freshness for AT LEAST these times.

In fact, apart from Eggs and Dairy products, most foods can last considerably long times.

Here are certain things that live for a VERY long time, expiration dates on them are mostly meaningless...

• Salt : Salt is a preservative and a mineral. It doesn't rot, it doesn't get stale and nothing grows in it. It can never go bad, not even in thousands of years.
• Sugar: Just like salt, sugar especially refined sugar never goes bad. Unless a certain pest (like say Ants) finds it's way to it. Same applies to brown sugar, Molasses of all types and other sugary syrups and fruits preserved by drying or in Jams.
• Honey, you will be surprised to know that few years back, some honey Jars that were over 2,000 years old were found to contain edible honey. Think of that next time you see 6 months at the store.
• Tea: Tea as dried leaves can live for a very long time. In fact, Tea gets BETTER with time. The longer it is left the better it becomes. Just like fine wine. It gets better with age.
• Rice: Do you know that the fine Basmati rice can't be eaten before it's aged for AT LEAST 2 years? Again, think about that when you get that 3 months expiration label at the store
• Grains in general can live for a very long time (Greater than 7 years) if its stored properly in cool dry places. In fact, Svalbard seed vault in the Norwegian frozen north contains a wide verity of seeds in case of a disaster. These seeds under these conditions are expected to last decades and still be plant-able after that
• Onions, garlic and chili peppers. These three don't need refrigeration. They naturally repel most pests, bacteria and fungi. They can also be dried with no problems. But they do considerably change taste and can rot. So watch out for any discoloration
• Oils and fats.These are pretty much inert and don't react with almost anything. They can survive for very long times. But their taste might change with time

Now to prolong the life of dairy, fruits, vegetables and meats, humans have invented so many ways to preserve things...

1. Drying or dehydration. This basically means letting the food lose it's water content so no micro organism can survive in it. Examples, Dried fruits, sun dried tomatoes, Jameed, Jerkey, Salami and others
2. Salting. By increasing the salt content, nothing grows in the product. Examples are, salted meats, but most famously salted Fish (Fseekh)
3. Pickling. Where salt, sugar, vinegar and spices are used as a preservative for many things from vegetables, to hard-boiled eggs, and even meats, poultry and fish. Dairy can't be picked because it curds when acids are added to it, but....
4. Yogurt and Cheese. Transforming Milk to these products is also a mechanism of preserving. As long as they stay away from the Air, they can last for a very long time (like in the case of cheese)
5. Smoking, this is one of my favorites. Where food is cooked on law heat in an oxygen deprived atmosphere where nothing survives. It's kind of like super disinfection. It adds a distinct flavor also. Most will follow it with some additional method like pickling, immersion in oil or salting to make things last for a very long time.
6. Irradiation: My least favorite method. In this method, all bacteria is killed inside and outside the product (usually fruits) then they are covered with a thin layer of wax to prevent air and oxidation from reaching inside. Fruits can last months without refrigeration
7. Freezing: Yep, things last a long time in the freezer. But they lose certain attributes, so this method was updated to include flash freezing. In which vegetables are frozen so quickly they don't get freezer burns or anything. They remain fresh for a very long time.
8. Canning, again, just making sure that air doesn't get to the goods.
9. Of course we can't forget Fermentation. In which fruit juices are converted to spirits through yeast that feeds on the natural sugars converting it to alcohol

There are other ways of course, the least of my favorites is adding preservatives. These are very potent chemical compounds that allow foods to stay edible for very long times, but it comes at a cost of course.

The sad part is that over the past 100 years or so, humanity has lost all these secrets to preservation for so many things. We started relying more and more on modern methods that older methods that have served us for thousands of years are becoming extinct. They're no longer being passed on from generation to generation. People don't have time to learn and do these things anymore.

We're becoming more and more dependant on what is written on a label of a product that most of the time, means absolutely nothing. We end up wasting our most precious treasure, food, that could mean life or death to someone in need. But it can also mean less waste, and a little bit more money in our wallets.

We should take a moment to look around, and get to know these things. Our ancestors were able to look at any vegetation and know if it was edible or not. For us now, all we see is green grass, and we have no idea what it is. We practically unlearned what took our ancestors thousands of years to gather.... We're leaving these thing to the "Experts"

That's only on preservation ... Imagine what could be said about natural remedies that were also lost over the ages in favor of harsh chemicals