Yeah, bacterial toxins are super hardy.
We did rounds on botulism after that recent case, found out about the deaths from carrot juice borne botulism in 2006 (http://www.cdc.gov/MMWR/preview/mmwrhtml/mm55d106a1.htm). This was Bolthouse carrot juice, the same thing my wife drinks (I prefer their Passion Orange Guava). Got home that night, found a huge bottle of Bolthouse carrot juice in the downstairs fridge, 2 weeks past expiry date (2 for 1 deal the last time we bought it). Botulism has nothing to do with best before dates but I dumped it anyway.
I have a prior history of food borne illness. Got the worst ever case of food poisoning from Yuki-jirushi (Snow Brand) low fat milk in 2000 when I lived in Kyoto. Turned out they had Staph Aureus in the milk plant, weren't cleaning the pipes properly (I used to work in an ice cream store, I know how hard it is to clean mild contamination off machinery). They were also taking expired milk and dumping it back into the pasteurizer. I got horribly horribly sick in the middle of judging an English speech contest in a suburban high school in Osaka. It was a huge scandal in Japan, the dairy originally tried to cover up what happened, recalled milk products only a few days later. Months later I had 2 Snow Brand guys show up at my apartment door unexpectedly, both wearing dark suits in the hot summer weather, bowing and apologizing profusely, and presenting me with a box of absolutely marvelous chocolate biscuits.
― Plasmon, Thursday, 21 February 2013 22:55 (eleven years ago) link
Mr. Jaq got staph poisoning from ice cream in the Bellagio a few years ago. I've never seen a sicker person, and it came on incredibly fast. Horrible stuff.
― Jaq, Friday, 22 February 2013 00:23 (eleven years ago) link