According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, three or four days is the cutoff date for leftovers to be thrown away or frozen, so anything remaining in your fridge from Turkey Day, a week ago, is well past the deadline and may be dangerous to consume.
The food may be teaming with bacteria and cause food poisoning, so it’s a good idea to do a frequent check, said Executive Chef Frank Liebold.
“Go through your refrigerator on a regular basis,” he said. “You have leftovers from restaurants one or two days, and they should go usually. Stuff that you’ve made, two, three, no more than four days.”
Therefore, Monday was the day you should have trashed the leftover turkey and the fixings, but what about the frozen leftovers?
“Rule of thumb is three months for freezing things, especially pies,” said Dawn Allen, associate professor of food science at Sinclair Community College.
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