I got a squirt can of Easy Cheese on my visit to the States in 2004, and I see it has a date on the bottom of Oct 04.
You could spray some out and if it’s green or smells bad it’s probably no good. I personally would not eat it if it’s expired. I had food poisoning once and never push fate a second time.
I think that may be like Twinkies - they don’t have shelf lives - they have half lives!!! 
Seriously, there are two “dates” that may be on food in the US. One is a “use by” date. The other is a “sell by” date. If you have a “sell by” date, depending on the food product, it could last indefinately afterwards. If it’s a “use by” date, I wouldn’t chance it.
On a similar vein:
why does bottle water have a “use by” date on it?
(actually I know the answer to this, but it’s kinda silly)
And the answer is?
because supposedly there are “chemicals” (such as acrylamide) that “may” be absorbed from the plastic into the water. I say supposedly because the plastic used in the bottles is kept under really strict control, so absorption is highly unlikely.
?
Mukade
Strangest thing that we ever ate that should have been expired was a head of lettuce that was in our crisper for over a month. It was crisp, green, and beautiful. We should have left it alone as an experiment.
Y’know…I have done something like that…
my wife hates onions, so I only use them when I cook for myself. Needless to say, they don’t get used very often.
One weekend, I guess about a year ago, my wife was out of town with her sister, so I thougt I’d make myself some killer fajitas or something…I bought 3 onions, and used only two…I put the other in the crisper for later.
Fast forward nine or ten months… my wife opens the crisper and discovers a scallion monster with huge tentacles growing in it. (we don’t use the crisper very often, as we usually cook what we buy and only for the two of us…) Somehow Mr. Onion was able to not only survive in the fridge, but thrive (it probably canniballized a sweet potato I had in there, that’s my best guess.) despite having little moisture and little light (the stalks were a pale greenish white, but they were alive and fresh)!
Against the protests of my wife I decided to keep the onion as a pet…it looks like a little baby Cthulhu! I might keep it when we move this weekend…or even better, I may put this little horror back into the crisper to awate the next tenant 
Technically speaking, Easy Cheese is not really food at all, so I don’t think it can go bad… how can something go BAD if it was never GOOD in the first place?
Food goes bad when it either gets inhabited by bacteria or fungi, or when it oxidizes. Being sealed inside a sterile airtight can, neither of these can happen so I suspect you can use this as long as you like. I’ll bet that expiration date is more of a CYA (cover your ass) thing that the maker puts there, possibly as a US Govt requirement.
I have heard that it is a good stain remover. Or was that cheese whiz…
One day in the supermarket I was discussing spag bol with a bloke I know as we stood by the cheese counter. I was after a block of Parmesan. He asked me why I was bothering to buy the block when you can buy it ready-grated in a tub. I said that I liked it freshly-grated. He said that he’d been using the same tub of grated for the past eleven years and it still tasted great to him. Aargh!
Steve
…and never trust the expiration date on non food items.
That’s presupposing that the packing environment was sterile to begin with.
Even vacuum-packed military MREs go bad (albeit after around 10 years or so at 60 degrees), because it’s near impossible to get rid of all the bacteria and stuff. In fact the warmer you keep an MRE, the faster it goes bad, for exactly that reason. See the handy chart: http://www.goldenseason.com.sg/mre_shelf_life.html
Considering that the first three ingredients in Easy Cheese are milk water, and whey protien there seems plenty of “food” there for bacteria to work on. If it’s past it’s expiration date, I wouldn’t eat it.
I squirted a bit out, it’s still the same colour (orange), but it’s a lot drippier than before, and a whole lot less appetising looking than it seemed in the supermarket in March 2004.
Actually, it wasn’t even appetising in the supermarket, I just wanted to show it to my work colleagues as an example of USA good eats.
Ah, there ya go Martin!
Proud to be an American…
Don’t ya just love the way we include two continents?
[quote="Martin MilnerActually, it wasn’t even appetising in the supermarket, I just wanted to show it to my work colleagues as an example of USA good eats.[/quote]
Yeah, and we Yanks have the nerve to make fun of bad British food… 
Yeah, and we Yanks have the nerve to make fun of bad British food… [/quote]
After seeing grits, and eating biscuits and gravy (read sponge and [censored]) I was already prepared for gastronomic disappointment. 
Yup, we Brits have a lot to answer for. Poor Beth had a couple of weeks trying to find food she could palate, until starvation drove her to eat British food (I use the term food very loosely).
The funny thing is the way we have “pretend” American food, like tinned hot dogs in brine, labelled “America’s Best” etc.
The easy cheese is now trying to crawl out of my waste bin.
Sometimes I think those “eat by” dates are on things that couldn’t spoil by bacteria so soon and I think it just means that the quality might have deteriorated. As in your case, the air leaked out of the cheese so it isn’t as puffy anymore when you spray it out.
I have never had spray cheese but I think I would prefer it to be puffy rather than sort of runny.
Grits are magnificent. And you must have had poorly made biscuits.
Cynth, I’m shocked! and you call yourself an American. 