Can The Sniff Test Really Tell You If Food Is Expired?

There's a fine line between food safety and food quality. So what does the sniff test actually tell you? Food safety experts explain.

The sniff test is a method you’ve probably used hundreds of times to determine whether that carton of milk is still good enough to splash into your morning coffee, or whether you can eat that container of leftovers that’s been in the fridge awhile.

Recently, British supermarket chain Morrisons began encouraging its shoppers to use the sniff test as a way to cut down on food waste. The company announced in January that it was forgoing use-by dates on milk, instead using “best before” dates and urging consumers to use the sniff test to tell whether the milk is still drinkable. It’s an effort to prevent hundreds of thousands of gallons of milk from being unnecessarily thrown away each year because of an old use-by date ― even though most milk products are still consumable for a few days after that point.