How to choose the right canned food

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

The assortment of canned products on store shelves dazzles. But do not lose your head over the labels with mouth-watering pictures and yellow price tags. A life hacker will tell you how to determine where high-quality meat, fish and vegetables are hidden.

Step 1. Inspect the jar

The appearance of a tin or aluminum can can tell a lot about the quality of the product inside it.

Do not buy wrinkled or scratched cans. Mechanical damage indicates a violation during transportation. If the can is thrown or hit, there is a high probability that its contents have turned into mush.

Don't buy canned food in bloated cans. This is a sign of a violation of the tightness of the package. If oxygen gets into canned food during storage, it turns into a breeding ground for bacteria.

The same applies to canned food in glass containers. If the metal cover is scratched or swollen, it is better to refuse the purchase.

Do not eat canned food if, after opening the can, you find rust or dark spots on its inner walls.

The inner surface of metal cans is usually coated with special enamel, varnish or Teflon. Brown or black spots inside the can indicate a poor finish. Most likely, the product was in contact with metal and oxidized.

Step 2. Shake the can

Gurgles? This means that there is little meat or fish in the jar, but more water.

If, after shaking a can of sardines, you hear pieces splashing in the filling, most likely there are very few fish inside. Prefer tightly packed canned foods.

It is easier with canned food in glass: the ratio of product and pouring is immediately clear. However, a glass jar is not always a guarantee of product quality.

Step 3. Examine the labeling

Marking is a set of numbers and letters by which the consumer can learn everything about canned food. It is applied to the bottom or lid of a metal can with paint or by embossing.

The latter method is preferable. After the expiration date, the old marking can be erased and a new one can be installed. This trick will not work with a metallic print.

The factory marking on the can is knocked out from the inside. Markings embossed on the outside are a sign of falsification.

According to GOST R 51074-97, the marking of canned food made in Russia consists of three or two lines.

The first row always shows the date of manufacture of the product. In the second and third - the assortment number of the product, the number of the manufacturer (one or two digits) and the index of the industry to which it belongs.

If the plant works in shifts, then the industry index, as a rule, is placed on the third line along with the number of the shift that produced the canned food. The industry index is indicated by the following letters:

• "A" - meat industry;
• "K" - fruit and vegetable farms;
• "M" - dairy industry;
• "R" - fishing industry;
• "TsS" - consumer cooperation.

The assortment number allows you to determine what kind of meat or fish is in canned food.

For example, a can of canned fish says:

051016

014157

1P

This means that inside there is a natural Atlantic herring (assortment number 014), produced at the enterprise No. 157 during the first shift on October 5, 2016.

It is especially useful to navigate the assortment numbers in the case of canned fish, as they are more often counterfeited. For example, instead of expensive salmon, they use a cheaper sardinella or put tails and bellies together with whole pieces of pink salmon.

Therefore, we give the assortment numbers of popular canned fish.

Type of canned fish	Assortment number
Natural pink salmon	85D
Natural cod liver	010
Natural saury	308
Smoked Atlantic mackerel in oil	222
Natural headless squid without skin	633
Natural Atlantic salmon	X23
Natural Atlantic sardine	G83
Caspian sprat uncut in tomato sauce	100
Smoked Baltic herring in oil	155

Having deciphered the marking, you can examine the label.

Step 4. Look at the name and production standard

Food products in Russia are produced in accordance with GOST or TU (technical specifications) - documents with requirements for product quality and procedures for its verification. GOSTs are developed and approved by state bodies, technical specifications - by the manufacturers themselves.

According to the habit left over from Soviet times, people look for the word "GOST" on the packaging, believing that if the canned food is made according to the state standard, inside it is like natural meat or fish. However, it should be understood that many GOSTs do not guarantee high product quality. A large number of Soviet GOSTs were replaced or canceled altogether.

Compare yourself. According to GOST 5284-84 "Beef stew" canned meat should have been at least 87%, and fat - not more than 10, 5%. It was replaced by GOST 32125-2013 “Canned meat. Stewed meat ", according to which the mass fraction of meat must be at least 58%, fat - no more than 17%.

The inscription "GOST" on the packaging does not guarantee a taste from childhood.

Many modern GOSTs allow the use of preservatives and chemical additives. But still they are more reliable than the TU. If the manufacturer does not add anything superfluous to the canned food made according to technical conditions, then the portion portion of the ingredients can greatly distort.

In addition to the weight composition of the product, the state standard regulates its name. If you don't have time to read the small print on the label, read what the canned food is called.

Beautiful florid names ("Spicy mackerel", "Home-style pork") are usually assigned to canned food made according to TU.

Step 5. Check with the manufacturer

Is his name heard? Does the brand appear on TV every now and then? It doesn't mean anything yet. The main thing is the location of the plant.

If canned fish is produced in the suburbs, then for sure from frozen fish. The quality of such a product is a priori lower. Ideally, canned fish should be made on the seashore, for example, on the Baltic and Black Sea coasts, in the Far East.

The same is with canned meat and meat-vegetable preserves. Give preference to producers located in large livestock centers of the country (Central Black Earth Region, Volga Region).

Step 6. Read the composition

There are a lot of canned food recipes. But the less extra ingredients in the composition, the better.

Ideally, the stew should contain nothing but pork or beef, natural fat, water and spices. Saury in oil is only fish, vegetable oil, salt and pepper. And green peas should contain only himself, water and salt with sugar.

Step 7. Look at the date of manufacture and expiration date

The month and year the bank is closed plays an important role. Especially in the case of canned fish and fruits and vegetables.

It is better when squash caviar or lecho have a summer or autumn production date. This increases the chance that the vegetables got into the jars almost from the garden. If the label says December or March, the canned food was probably made from products that had time to lie down in the warehouse.

Remember some of the timing of the fishing trip:

• Salmon are harvested from about mid-July to late September.
• Saury is caught from August to October.
• Sprat and Baltic herring are harvested in July and August.

The shelf life of canned food starts from the date of production. For fish, it should not exceed 2 years, for meat - a maximum of 5 years (stew - 2 years), for vegetables - 3 years.

Step 8. Compare prices

Processing natural meat and fish, growing vegetables requires a lot of costs from the manufacturer. At the same time, canned food still needs to be properly packaged and delivered to customers safe and sound.

The price of good canned food cannot be low.

If you choose canned food according to the algorithm described above, the chance that the sprats will be moderately salty with a pleasant haze aroma, and the meat jelly will not stick to your teeth, is very high.