What Is The Shelf Life For Canned Butter?

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Whether you're using it in a beef Wellington recipe or to make a triple chocolate chunk pizookie, butter is a staple ingredient that earns the honor of being the be-all and end-all of cooking necessities. It's a product that's extremely easy to run through though, making it all the better to stock up ahead of time to avoid frequent trips to the grocery store. But loading up can be difficult to do with refrigerated butter, which only lasts between one to three months. Canned butter, on the other hand, can last you a whole lot longer.

Your mind might immediately go to home canned goods, an increasingly popular method that helps extend your food's shelf life. And while that's generally a stellar way to reduce food waste and preserve ingredients, it is dangerous to do with dairy since it's low in acid and will promote the growth of a deadly bacteria called Clostridium botulinum, which causes botulism. You can instead purchase butter that's already been safely canned. Take, for instance, single cans of H.J. Wijsman's preserved Dutch butter or a 24-pack of Beurdell's French salted canned butter. 

Looking more closely at the brand Red Feather as an example, these sealed cans of butter are usually guaranteed a shelf life of at least two years. That can even be extended to a whopping 10 years if left unopened and kept in a cool, dark, and dry place, as one of the essential rules to follow when storing canned food is avoiding temperature fluctuations.

Even with the surprisingly long shelf life canned butter has, it's always important to be able to recognize signs of spoilage. This is especially imperative when working with canned goods that are at risk of developing the previously mentioned bacteria, Clostridium botulinum. Botulism isn't as common in commercially canned items, but it's not impossible and can lead to deadly food poisoning or extremely unpleasant symptoms like facial weakness, difficulty breathing, nausea, and even paralysis.

To avoid this life-threatening illness, there are a few ways to tell if your canned butter has gone bad. You should dispose of the product if the packaging itself is leaking or squirting liquid upon being opened. The same goes for if it's bulging or already dented. A slightly off odor is also a bad sign, as is a change in color. Any deviation from the butter's original quality or damage to its can are enough reason to be wary that your dairy product isn't at peak freshness anymore and that it shouldn't be eaten.