Expiration Date: 4 Weeks Ago
So your roommate left bread in the cupboard over the holiday break. It looks green, fuzzy and disgusting yet somehow manages to smell even worse.
You want to know whether you need to toss it out right away for your own safety or to wait for your roommate to find it and deal with it on her own.
Image: MD Health
To answer this question, we first need to look at what makes food rot in the first place: spoilage microbes. This group consists of bacteria and fungi which work simultaneously to digest foods. Essentially, your roommate let a bunch of microscopic creatures beat her to the punch.
When you see those colorful fuzzy patches on your bread or fruit, those are from a specific type of fungus called mold.
Image: Imagination Station
Mold is a really fascinating microbe because it appears to be very large. It is really more like a bunch of smaller organisms linking up into a network that looks like one big organism. Sometimes cells even combine by breaking down cell walls and sharing a single nucleus amongst multiple cells.
This is equivalent to sharing one brain amongst many humans. I can assure you that it is much more effective in mold than it would be with people.
So now you’ve identified that your roommate's bread is infested with molds and bacteria but what is causing that smell?
Well, these microbes are actually battling it out to eat and reproduce faster than each other. In fact, they are so competitive that they likely launch into chemical warfare. These chemicals that they’re spewing at their competitors are what account for the really nasty, strong smells often associated with rotting fruit.
Image: QuickMeme
The deep musky smell that is likely on your roommate’s bread comes specifically from molds when they release spores—their reproductive cells—into the air.
Now for the real question though, should you toss the bread out right away? Not necessarily. If the bread is confined to an area where its new microbes can’t spread to other food then you’re most likely fine to let your roommate deal with it. If there’s a chance that those musky spores are floating along to other foods though, definitely toss it and keep a close eye on the nearby foods before attempting to eat them.
Generally speaking, just being in the presence of spoilage microbes isn’t harmful, but pay attention and don’t accidently eat any! As a rule of thumb, if it looks funny and/or smells funny, regardless of the expiration date of the food, toss it. It’s better to be safe than to be caught up in someone else’s chemical warfare.
Image: Giphy