platyhiker

In recent years, I have heard multiple food/safety experts (in radio interviews) explain that the expiration dates indicate when the producer feels that taste and/or texture may no longer be up to their standards, but it is definitely not and indication of when the product is no longer safe to consume. They say to use your eyes, nose and common sense - if the product looks or smells "off", then don't eat it.

I eat the food from cans that are past the use-by dates. In some very long past (e.g. two years), I can tell that the flavor is weaker than a "fresh" can. I've never had a can that even smelled bad.

gale

I've used expired cans of food. I think the vast majority of the canned foods I use are single ingredient (or one main ingredient plus salt, spice, etc). I'm not sure I'd use something like a soup with that many ingredients if it was expired but I don't think it would be unsafe, necessarily.