Episode 7 Rip Off Britain

There's a lot we don't know about the food on our plates

and the shops and the labels don't always tell you the whole story.

I think they encourage you to buy more than you need

and that causes a lot of waste.

Whether you're staying in or going out,

you've told us that you can feel ripped off

by the promises made for what you eat

and, indeed, what you pay for it.

How do you know that it's half-price, right?

So, what they've done, they've bumped the price up

and then knocked it down.

From claims that don't stack up to the secrets behind the packaging,

we'll uncover the truth about Britain's food

so that you can be sure that you are getting what you expect

at the right price.

Your food, your money. This is Rip-Off Britain.

Hello, and welcome to Rip-Off Britain,

where, this series, we're investigating

everything to do with food. And today, we're going to be looking

at some of those old pieces of inherited wisdom

surrounding how you cook, store and eat certain foods.

And as well as that, we'll be getting to the bottom

of more of the questions and problems

that you've asked us to solve on your behalf.

Now, in many cases, you've been in touch with us

about the claims made for a product

or the information that's actually on the packaging.

But often what's prompted you to get in touch

is to find out the real truth behind some of those long-held beliefs

and ideas that can influence not just what we buy

but what we do with it and how quickly we have to use it up.

So, today, as we separate quite a few food facts from fiction,

be prepared for a couple of surprises

that might even change the way that you do things in your own home.

And among the nuggets of advice that we'll have along the way,

you get ready for a method of cooking what is an old favourite

that you've probably never even considered before.

Coming up, the warnings saying once food has been opened,

you should eat it within a certain number of days or weeks.

Well, we've done some tests to see what happens if you don't.

So, this is the coleslaw that we tested

and the manufacturers say that you should eat it,

after opening, within two days.

Busting the surprisingly common myths still cooked up

for the microwave oven.

I definitely think that some waves come out of it, could be bad for you

and I definitely wouldn't have any of my children near the microwave

when it was on.

Now, how long can you keep food before it goes off?

I reckon many of us have got those bottles and jars

lurking in the back of our fridges and cupboards

that should have been eaten weeks ago.

You know the kind of thing -

the pesto sauce that's been there for ages,

the lemon curd that's living up to its name,

and that bottle of cranberry sauce that's been there since Christmas.

It all sounds really familiar to me.

Well, even if the label says that, after opening,

you should eat within four weeks, do you have to obey that?

Well, one couple who do so religiously contacted us.

They said they were throwing away so much food

that they wondered if they were really doing the right thing.

Delve deep into most fridges

and you'll probably find stuff that's outstayed its welcome -

a half-eaten jar or long-forgotten package of something

that leaves you wondering whether you should polish off the rest.

It depends what it smells like, I think.

So, I'll have sort of a whiff and then decide, actually,

if it's not right, I'm not going to eat it.

I'm 50 years old and I've never had food poisoning

and I've always used my common sense around these sort of things

and been OK, so...

Here at Rip-Off Britain, we're also great believers

in a common-sense approach too,

and, indeed, we've often suggested it's the way to test foods

that might be slightly past their best before date.

But sniffing or prodding the contents

of part-finished containers won't always give you the answer,

which is why the labels on many foods carry the advice that,

once opened, you should consume within two days,

two weeks or whatever.

Debbie and Tony Styles have always wondered about that advice

and they're not entirely sure they believe it.

Use within two days. Really?

You mean, after 48 hours, they self-destruct?

You do feel as though you are wasting money. That's the issue.

Because you end up throwing away half a jar of something

because you've not been able to use it in time.

And you can't trust yourself to go over that time limit.

Fed up with throwing away half-eaten jars and bottles

the two of them weren't able to use within the time stipulated,

Debbie and Tony contacted us here at Rip-Off Britain.

They wanted to know if they're doing the right thing

and getting rid of food that's potentially harmful

or whether they're simply falling for a ploy by manufacturers

to make us replenish our cupboards sooner.

For instance, we've got English mustard and American mustard,

and the American makes no mention of a "use within"

and the English mustard says, "Use within six weeks."

And I never use it within six weeks

and I probably refuse to use it within six weeks, frankly,

cos I'm convinced it's fine for much, much longer.

We're just thoroughly confused about what we can believe,

or should believe.

To help Debbie and Tony find the answer,

we've called in food hygiene expert Dr Lisa Ackerley

and she believes the advice is there for a good reason.

Once you open a packet,

the original atmosphere in which they were packed has been changed,

so everything changes,

and that includes the length of time that you can keep the food.

And that's why you get instructions on the packet

to tell you how long you're allowed to keep the food

after you've opened the packet.

Lisa can't wait to have a good old rummage

around Debbie and Tony's kitchen.

-Let's have a look in your fridge.

-OK.

Wow, you've got quite a lot in there, haven't you?

Yes, we like our food.

On our series last year, we revealed that some dried foods,

like herbs, and of course tinned goods,

can last for years or even decades.

If I did find anything that was out of date, I would check it.

I would use my smell, my taste, my common sense.

But it's a very different story when it comes to some of the other things

we might have lurking in our cupboards or fridge.

So, as Lisa hunts for the things we typically hold on to for too long,

she's looking not for things you can keep for yonks

or for obviously perishable foods with a clear best before date.

She's after those rather more ambiguous jars and products

that carry that recommendation

to eat within a certain number of days after opening.

She quickly spots two that fall somewhere in between.

They've got a short life

but, for a couple like Debbie and Tony,

they're not easy to finish off in one go.

This is a pot of hummus and this is two days -

use within two days of opening.

And the same for this egg mayonnaise, so...

Is that because that's an egg product?

That's why it's only two days?

Well, it's egg and it's mayonnaise, so, basically,

-lots of nutrients for bacteria to grow.

-Yeah.

You don't know what you're introducing

when you put a spoon in here.

-Even though you think your hands are clean and...

-Exactly.

-We dip a breadstick in it.

-Yeah.

-Bite it, dip it back in again.

-Yeah.

But your bacteria in your mouths or on your hands

are quite friendly on your hands, but if they get into food,

they can actually produce toxins, which could make you ill,

-even if they were your bacteria in the first place.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

But Tony's biggest bugbear

and the things he finds most painful to throw away unfinished

are his condiments - mustard, tartare sauce and horseradish.

All those things that, like him,

you may find hard to use up in the time that's recommended.

What we've got is classic things such as mayonnaise here.

We've got some sauce. We've got mustard.

So, this group of foods has got...

They've got natural preservatives in them,

which gives a little bit longer shelf life in the fridge,

but nothing seems to last forever

because eventually, they will deteriorate.

As soon as you've opened that,

then you go into the sort of safety angle

and we need to make sure that you don't keep the food for too long.

However reluctantly,

Debbie and Tony do follow the label's advice

and end up throwing away a lot of food as a result.

But when Lisa canvasses opinion

from some of their fellow Peterborough residents,

it's clear that many have a very different approach.

I've got some pesto here.

Could you tell me how long you might leave that in the fridge

once you've opened the lid?

Um, until I literally need the space that it's in.

How long would I keep it for?

There's probably some sitting in there

that's six months old or something.

OK, well, it's actually two weeks.

-I'm not coming round your house.

-THEY LAUGH

Do you know that, on the label,

it actually gives you some instructions

about how long you should keep them for?

-Yeah, I'm well aware of that.

-Does that not worry you?

It should but, no, I'm quite lazy.

So, we've got some dip here. What do you think about that?

How long do you think that should be kept

once the lid's come off it in the fridge?

I'd say a week.

I'd generally chuck it if there was a little bit left in the bottom

cos also, people are, like, dipping in

and I'm a bit funny about that as well.

So, it's about three days for this once it's been opened.

It would probably arrive, if someone brought it for a party,

and next time I was looking for it for a party, I'd see if it was OK.

THEY LAUGH

No-one's coming to my house to eat ever again.

Well, luckily, it can be quite simple

to spot when many foods are past their best,

and back at Debbie and Tony's, Lisa's brought with her

some items that will test the couple's instincts

when it comes to what's safe and what's not.

OK, so, we've got tomato paste, which is a bit of a kitchen staple.

-I should think every home's got one of these.

-Mm-hm.

But it's not going to last forever because look what happens,

typically, when you're using these packs,

-is that they actually break...

-The air's getting in.

..and the air's getting in

and then your contamination will be getting in as well.

So, they don't last forever.

About three weeks, as it says on the pack.

But sometimes, just looking at the packet shows

when something's on the turn.

So, Lisa, this juice is four days, I think. It is.

-"Use within four days."

-Yeah. Actually, just wait a minute.

Can you feel anything about that juice that's a bit odd?

Oh, yes, sometimes, the packaging can feel

as though it's blowing up with excess air or gas in it.

Something's going on inside the pack.

That could be something like yeast, possibly,

that are still there that have started to ferment,

so you'll actually get it going slightly fizzy.

So, when something starts to go a bit bulging,

then that's time to definitely throw it away,

even if it's within the four days of opening.

How cool your fridge is can make a big difference

to how long your food will last.

To keep it fresher for longer,

your appliance should be kept at 5 degrees Celsius or lower,

but things like over-frozen ice boxes

and dodgy seals can often mean temperatures fluctuate,

so Lisa wants to see if Debbie and Tony have got it right.

For Debbie and Tony, what makes all this especially confusing

is the varying recommendations

for how long different foods should last once they've been opened.

Their favourite - horseradish -

apparently needs to be used within a month of opening,

but tomato puree lasts for three weeks,

and this pesto, just two weeks.

The manufacturer will have thought about what ingredients are in here,

what preservative effect they have,

and consideration of the fridge temperature

and what you might be introducing,

so 14 days is actually quite a long time for something like this.

Now, what you'll actually see in here...

-What can you see in there?

-It looks like some separation.

-Can you see some little white bits in there?

-Oh, yeah.

-Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

-Let's have a sniff.

-Oh, boy!

-SHE LAUGHS

Thank you.

I mean, that's obviously the worst thing that can happen later on.

The longer you leave it, the more furry it's going to go.

-And obviously, nobody would eat that.

-Enough.

-There you go, madam.

-Thank you.

Debbie and Tony's pesto would have lasted a good deal longer

if they'd put it into ice cube trays

and frozen it before it got to that stage.

But Lisa's visit has reassured them that the advice on the labels

isn't there simply to encourage more sales.

So, how do you feel that you might have to throw away

all of this at some point?

I know it still looks a lot and it's still an expense,

but I'm thinking about my health, my future health,

so I'll continue to abide by the rules on the jars.

-Right. That's great.

-And I'm a lot less cynical, frankly,

-than I was before we spoke.

-Oh, OK. Right.

Because part of me was concerned that they were overstating

the importance of two days or four days or whatever,

but you've rammed it home that they're to be listened to.

But, like most of us, they hate to add

to the seven million tonnes of food going to waste in the UK every year.

So, before we all start chucking out half the food in our fridges,

we couldn't resist finding out what happens

if you don't stick to the advice on how long some foods can be kept.

We've been to a lab.

We're going to test five foods and take samples every day for a week.

And we'll reveal the results of our experiment

later in the programme.

Now, there can be so many stories in the papers

about what's good or bad for us

that it's sometimes very hard to know who or what to believe.

But in this case, have we got it all wrong?

In 1974, space-age technology arrived in British kitchens.

A device that promised convenience

and to revolutionise the way we cook.

Just select the recipe you want,

enter the weight and you can do the whole thing in minutes.

Even an idiot can learn to defrost.

And I have.

But those promises came with a name

that was more Cold War than kitchen counter,

and a hi-tech way of working

that created a terrifying legend all of its own.

In all the recent concern about food safety,

a lot of attention has been focused on microwave ovens.

Are they safe?

In what must be one of the biggest urban fairy tales

of the modern age, microwaves were rumoured to be dangerous

for anyone from pregnant women to those with pacemakers.

Look. Did you see that? It went right up to high.

And these rumours persist today,

decades after the humble microwave found its way

into more than 90% of British homes.

I don't terribly trust them.

There's always that myth

that you shouldn't stand next to the microwave while it's on.

They used to be said to emit radiation.

That might be complete tosh.

I've heard you're better off not cooking with it,

but it's easy to heat up a meal, so...

Donna Harrison is a mum of three who uses her microwave

to reheat her children's food every single day.

While Donna admits that she couldn't live without her microwave,

she remains very deeply suspicious

of how it works and even if it's safe.

I wouldn't be standing this close to the microwave when it's on.

You have no way of knowing whether the microwave is leaking or not.

Ooh, yum, yum.

I definitely think that something, sort of some waves come out

and it could be bad for you in some way or form.

And I definitely wouldn't have any of my children

near the microwave when it was on.

So, to help Donna find out

if, in fact, her worries have got any basis,

we've brought her to Oxford University

to meet a leading expert in physics, Professor Tony Weidberg.

If anyone knows whether that box of tricks in your kitchen is safe,

it's him, and he's absolutely certain

that Donna has nothing to worry about.

We have a metal box.

Metal is a very good absorber for microwaves,

so the energy coming out can be kept at a negligible level.

OK, I've brought some baby food with me.

To prove his point,

Tony has a device that tests for any radiation

that just might be leaking from the microwave.

So, let's start with the grid, see if there's anything coming up.

Got tiny readings,

but it's well below the five-milliwatt safety level.

And I can look around the seal.

If the seal was bad, I would see some leakage.

The seal looks very good.

What about the sides and the back area?

Well, look at the side. The side is solid metal.

I wouldn't expect anything to come out

and I don't actually see...get any reading.

The back is still getting a reading of 0.00,

so this looks pretty good.

Well, that's reassuring news for Donna,

but still, the official advice is not to get too close.

Stay 5cm away.

So, don't put your eye right against the grid,

don't touch the grid.

That will ensure the levels are even lower and you're even safer.

So, do microwaves ever leak, and if they did leak,

what could be the cause of them leaking?

If they're not kept clean and the seals are full of dirt -

so much dirt that the seal becomes leaky -

much more microwave radiation can leak out.

So, it's a good job I keep my microwave very clean, then.

But while she's at least reassured on the safety front,

Donna's got a long way to go

before she can learn to love her microwave,

not least because she's got no idea

how to use it for anything other than reheating.

So, we're taking Donna to meet someone

who can show her exactly how to do that.

Indeed, so passionate is Jennipher Marshall-Jenkinson

about the microwave,

that she says she's not cooked in a conventional oven

for something like 30 years.

Microwave ovens, they are great.

They are the safest,

most energy-efficient piece of cooking equipment

that is out there.

All my children have never eaten any meal that I've cooked for them

that hasn't been cooked in a microwave oven.

Jennipher's actually chair of the UK Microwave Association,

so it's not surprising that she's evangelical

in spreading the word about the oven's benefits.

So, she's going to see if she can win over not just Donna,

but some of her equally sceptical friends.

I often find that it doesn't taste as nice

and it's often dry, goes dry around the edges.

So, why should I stop using my traditional method

of using my hob or oven and switch to the microwave

if it doesn't taste as fresh or as good?

I think a great deal of this

comes down to understanding about what microwaves can do

and what they're capable of.

Microwaves are using the moisture that's in the food itself

to cook the food. Therefore, it's a moist method of cooking.

You'll never be able to roast potatoes in a microwave.

You'll never be able to make toast.

So, microwave ovens are really, really fantastic

at cooking some foods, for example, cakes, fish and vegetables.

Mum Cathy only uses her microwave to reheat food,

and she's concerned that vegetables cooked in it

might not be as nutritious as hob-cooked veg.

I currently steam all my vegetables,

which is very simple, very quick and very tasty.

How does the microwave cope with the food once it's been in there?

Well, I'm very pleased to say

nutrients are retained in microwave-cooked vegetables.

They stay in the vegetables

because you're not diluting the nutrients with water

as you're cooking them.

You're literally cooking them in their own moisture

in the microwave oven.

Although some vitamins, such as vitamin C,

are broken down by heat,

other nutrients are more likely to be retained

through microwave cooking because they're cooked quickly,

heated for the shortest amount of time

and done so using as little liquid as possible.

MICROWAVE BEEPS

Donna, Mark and Cathy only use their microwaves to reheat food,

so Jennipher wants to show them the machines can cook as well,

and she's picked out two dishes that she says triumph in the microwave.

First off, it's bacon.

So, I've got three rashers of bacon here

and each rasher of bacon, I know,

will take approximately one minute in the microwave to crisp up.

It does smell good, I have to say that.

It's popping a lot.

MICROWAVE BEEPS

It looks OK.

And if that wasn't enough to change their minds,

the fairy cakes Jennipher whips up and cooks in the microwave

in just one minute go a long way to winning them all round.

MICROWAVE BEEPS

And here's the finished result.

For me, as a working mum, pop all the ingredients in a bowl,

pop them in the microwave

and you get 24 fairy cakes coming out within a minute,

ice them and put the sprinkles on top,

-is a fantastic idea.

-Delicious.

So, now that Donna's armed with cooking tips

and has had her safety fears allayed,

has she a different opinion about that little metal box?

I think it has dispelled a lot of the myths.

With three children, I think it is all about saving time where I can

and maybe cutting a few corners in that respect,

especially if there's no nutrients lost in the actual cooking.

So, I think, from that point of view,

I will definitely be using my microwave more.

As we've seen, it's not just sell by or use by dates

that show the time by which foods should be eaten.

Some products carry a warning that, after opening,

they should be consumed within a certain number of days -

things like cream cheese, fruit juices or jars of pickles.

Well, we wanted to understand the risk

if you don't instantly follow that advice

and whether, rather than simply erring on the side of caution

and throwing half-eaten food away,

you could still happily tuck in for a few more days.

So, we asked microbiologist Dr Margarita Gomez Escalada

to do some tests.

So, we have some orange juice,

some coleslaw salad, hummus,

soft cheese and sour cream and chive dip.

So, what we'll do is we'll take samples

for all the rest of the products

and then we'll put all of them in the fridge

and take samples every day for a week.

It says on the packaging that this hummus,

coleslaw and sour cream should all be eaten within two days of opening,

the orange juice must be drunk within four days

and the cream cheese should be used within five days.

But what happens if they're not?

Margarita will take daily swabs to test the level of bacteria -

an important measure of how safe the food is to eat.

What we're going to be testing for in these foods

are three things, really.

We're going to be looking for total viable counts,

which are just a general count

of all the bacterial content in the food.

We're then going to look for faecal coliforms,

which are bacteria that come from the gut,

which are those most likely to cause infection.

And then we're going to specifically look for salmonella.

If there were any traces of salmonella

or so-called faecal coliforms like E. coli or listeria,

then the food would be dangerous.

And while, reassuringly, none of our tests turned up

any such bacteria, those aren't the only things to look out for.

Food also contains other types of everyday bacteria

which are safe to eat,

provided they're below a certain level.

The Health Protection Agency says food will become unsafe to eat

if there are over a million bacteria per gram of food.

So, in our daily testing, we were checking

if the number of these bacteria went over one million

and might therefore make you ill.

So, the hummus we tested was set to be used within two days of opening.

As we opened it, we found that it had 300 bacteria per gram of food

and after seven days,

we found it had 330 bacteria per gram.

From a microbiological point of view,

the hummus, after seven days of opening,

would be safe to eat.

With bacteria levels so low

five days after it's recommended you should throw it away,

it's a cautious thumbs-up for our hummus.

Next is the coleslaw.

So, this is the coleslaw that we tested

and the manufacturers say that you should eat it,

after opening, within two days.

Bacteria levels naturally go up and down,

and in the coleslaw, they peaked at 22,900 per gram,

but that's still well below the dangerous one million bacteria mark.

So, after seven days, it remains safe to eat.

All these values are within the acceptable parameters

of the Health Protection Agency guidelines.

So far, we've found only very low levels of everyday bacteria,

suggesting that automatically chucking opened food away

isn't always necessary.

Will things change with this dip?

Now, this is the results for the sour cream and chive dip

and it says, again, that once opened,

eat within two days.

The values that we found on the day of opening,

which was day one, was 1,780 bacteria per gram.

After seven days,

the levels of bacteria in the sour cream and chive dip

haven't increased significantly to make the food unsafe to eat.

Thumbs up for the dip, but what about the orange juice?

So, this is the juice that we tested.

This is fresh orange juice.

The manufacturers say that it should be drunk

within four days of opening.

We tested it on day one

and we found 40 bacteria per millilitre of juice,

which is quite low.

Perhaps surprisingly, the bacteria levels by day seven,

which is three days after

the manufacturers say you should drink it,

were actually lower than at the start.

The amount of bacteria in the juice was very low,

but this is not surprising

because, specifically, orange juice is very acidic

and bacteria prefer a more neutral environment to live,

so they wouldn't thrive very well in juice.

I'd be happy to drink this juice after six days of opening.

Orange may well be fine due to its high acidity,

but other fruit drinks, which are sweeter,

can have much higher bacteria and shouldn't be left as long.

So, four out of our five foods have proved OK to eat

several days beyond the point that's supposed to be the cut-off,

but what about our cream cheese?

The manufacturers say that you should eat this

within five days of opening.

We tested it on day one, on the day of opening,

and we found that it had 80 bacteria per gram of cheese.

Then we also tested it at seven days.

This is two days after the manufacturers say

that it's not usable any more.

However, we found only 10 bacteria per gram of cheese.

It's very, very low indeed.

It's not actually surprising that it is so low.

Soft cheese doesn't have a lot of water.

Bacteria need water to grow.

Well, after several days, the sort of foods we tested

probably won't look or taste as fresh

as when they were first brought.

Coleslaw can separate, for example, and hummus can turn hard.

But when it comes to bacteria which makes food dangerous to eat,

well, in our tests, they were all given a clean bill of health.

But if you're the type who ends up chucking food away

rather than risking eating it

just a day or two beyond what the packaging suggests,

like Debbie and Tony who we met earlier in the programme,

well, our test does appear to show that may not always be necessary.

I think people should use their common sense to look at food

and make a judgment whether their food has gone off or not.

If the food has gone off,

it will smell different, it will taste different.

Well, we've seen quite a few old chestnuts

-thoroughly debunked on today's programme.

-Haven't we?

But it just goes to show that some of the advice

that we've instinctively clung to for years

can be little better than an old housewives' tale,

which is especially frustrating when, actually,

all any of us want to know is how to store it,

cook it and eat food in the simplest and safest way.

But if there is anything to do with food

that still leaves you just that little bit baffled or unsure,

then do let us know and we'll see if it's something

that we can all investigate on a future programme.

But I'm afraid that's all that we've got time for today.

We'll be seeing you again very soon.

-So, from all of us on the team, bye-bye.

-Bye-bye.

-Bye.