And I love cottage cheese! Go figure.

Back 'home" we used to say you can tell who went to university -they always sniff the milk before pouring it into their tea, even in the poshest of places. It's a bad habit I can't break for sure. Even at the rate we consume milk (at least a gallon a day)

Oh and re the depression/whatever, I was mostly brought up by my Nan who learned her housekeeping skills in WWII. I have a huge stockpile of food in the basement. Very little food is thrown away.

This site has the 411 on all your fridge science experiments
http://www.stilltasty.com/

A fairly foolproof way of checking milk is boiling the kettle, putting the water into a cup and then pouring in a bit of milk. If it doesn't look like tea should, then the milk is off. No smelling or checking of expiry dates required.

Having said that, I'm squeamish about meat which I've thawed myself. If someone else cooks it, then whether or not it's off or not doesn't cross my mind, but if it's me who takes it out of the packaging, then usually I find myself simply unable to...which I mostly cook with tofu which doesn't provoke the same bleeer reaction. Totally illogical.

My dad used to be a bugger for eating out of date food. he couldnt abide waste of any kind. It helped of course that he had an iron fucking gut.

Sausage gone mouldy? Cut away the mould and cook the bastard anyway.

Then again, when he accidentally poisoned Mum and half her siblings at a dinner party, by not fully cooking the kidney beans in a chilli, he was fine. And he had been popping them raw into his mouth whilst he was cooking.