What Happens if you eat Expired Cheerios Cereal?

Cheerios are definitely a pantry staple if you have small children. They are a great starter food for toddlers and also a great snack for older kids. We regularly eat them plain, with milk, and we even make a trail mix with them for school snacks.

We recently came across a box of cheerios that must have been hidden for a while in the pantry because this box expired a while ago. Let’s deep dive into if it is ok to eat expired cheerios cereal!

Do Cheerios ever go bad?

Cheerios cereal just like other cereals can go bad over time. The biggest factors of the cereal going bad has less to do with the “best by” date and more to do with how it is stored.

Ideally, Cheerios should be stored in the original packaging and then placed in a cabinet or pantry. The big things we want to avoid is moisture, heat, and direct sunlight.

When Cheerios are exposed to moisture, not only will they become sticky, but they will also have the ability to start growing mold and bacteria. This is when Cheerios can potentially make you sick.

If Cheerios are exposed to heat or direct sunlight, it will start to affect the overall quality of the cereal. This could make the cereal harden or make it taste stale like cardboard.

Cheerios do have some fat in them, so it is possible for them to go rancid. This means the cereal would have an off smell like burnt oil and would have a very unpleasant taste and aftertaste.

How do you know if Cheerios are bad?

This box of Cheerios has a “best if used by” date of March 2021, so that means it is currently almost 2 years out of date. We are going to use our 5 senses and common sense to determine if these Cheerios are safe to eat.

Sight– First, I am going to inspect the outside cardboard packaging. I am looking for holes in th box that could be from bugs or rodents. I am also looking for discoloration and soft spots in the cardboard that could indicate the box had gotten wet or absorbed moisture. This box seems intact and with no outside damage.

Next, I will open the box and inspect the inside plastic bag. The bag should still be sealed at the top and the bottom. I flip the inside bag around and look for any tears or holes in the plastic.

The inner bag of this box of cereal, is intact with no signs of damage so we can keep going!

Sound– There isn’t really a sound to Cheerios, but after removing the inner plastic bag, I did shake the box to see if I could hear any lose cereal in the box. There were none so there was no sound.

Touch– At this point, I am ready to open the inner plastic bag and see if the Cheerios texture has been altered. The cheerios still feel firm, and I see no cereal clumped together. When the Cheerios stick together, this is a sign of moisture inside the packaging.

If the cheerios feel really soft or if they feel like they will crumble under a little pressure, these are signs that the cereal has been exposed to high heat, moisture, or direct sunlight.

Smell– Now we will go in for the sniff test. Cheerios are primarily made of whole grain oats so the smell should be similar to that plain oatmeal. If the aroma from the cereal is overly sweet, similar to burnt oil, or just off then you should go ahead and throw the cereal away.

This box of cheerios has a very light oat smell, and I did not notice anything out of the ordinary.

Taste– Now it’s time to taste some Cheerios cereal. Plain Cheerios without milk are actually pretty plain with barely any taste at all. The taste is more like plain oatmeal. (It is only once you add milk, that Cheerios get a little sweetness.)

My expired box of Cheerios taste completely normal. Each ring is firm and not overly hard or soft. After eating a small handful of dry cereal, there was no lingering aftertaste.

This box even though it was marked “best if used by” almost 2 years ago, is completely fine and safe to eat!

How long can you eat Cheerios after expiration date?

Based on eating Cheerios that expired 2 years ago and them being completely fine, I estimate that as long as the cereal is stored well you can safely eat it for 2-4 years past the date.

It is only once the cereal is exposed to heat, sunlight, and moisture that the cereal starts to degrade.

Honestly, I was surprised that the cereal did not have a stale or cardboard taste. It tasted just like fresh Cheerios!

In order to keep your cereal from going stale once you open it, I like to roll the top of the inner plastic bag down and secure with a chip clip.

If you were to leave the bag open inside of the box, it will expose the cereal to air and that will make it start to lose flavor and texture.

By using a chip clip, this box of cereal will be fine to eat for another 3-4 months. I’ve never actually had a box of open cereal for longer than 4 months, so it may actually still good for a few more months.

We have a rule at our house that we only have 2 opened boxes of cereal at the same time, so in order to open a new box we have to finish one of the open ones. This helps us to lower our food waste by using the cereal before it goes stale.

It also helps us rotate out cereals and not have a ton of opened cereal. When it is time to open another box of cereal, we usually choose the oldest one in the pantry, or we take a family vote to see what is next.

For more information on commonly expired foods, check out “What Happens if you Eat Expired Whole Wheat Pasta?” and “What happens if you eat expired Canned Black-Eyed Peas?“