Food-safety guidance on handling, cooking, storage, spoilage signs and when food should be discarded.
Slightly flexible broccoli may just be dehydrated. Slimy or mushy broccoli, especially with a bad odor, mold, or wet decay, should be thrown away rather than rinsed or cooked to rescue it.
Dark, dry edges on cut cabbage are often surface browning and dehydration. Trim the thin layer and inspect underneath; discard cabbage that is wet, slimy, soft, moldy, or rotten-smelling.
Tiny flat black specks in otherwise crisp cabbage may be pepper spot, a quality defect. Dark areas that are wet, translucent, mushy, slimy, or bad-smelling suggest damage or decay instead.
Condensation on the bag is not automatically spoilage, but slime on the leaves is. When spinach is slick, water-soaked, matted, or bad-smelling, discard the affected bag rather than rinsing it to rescue it.
A cabbage-like or sulfurous smell can be normal for cauliflower, especially during cooking. Toss it when the odor is clearly sour or rotten and the florets are also slimy, wet, soft, or moldy.
One small dry spot on firm broccoli can often be trimmed. If dark areas are wet, sunken, fuzzy, spreading through the florets, slimy, or bad-smelling, discard the broccoli.
Small dry spots on an otherwise firm head are usually a quality problem you can trim. Dark areas that are wet, sunken, fuzzy, widespread, slimy, or bad-smelling are signs to toss the cauliflower.
Dark seeds alone do not mean an eggplant has spoiled. They often show that the fruit is more mature, and cold storage can also brown seeds; judge the flesh for firmness, wet decay, mold, and off odors.
Dry flexibility can be water loss; slime is different. Beans that are wet, slippery, collapsing, moldy, or foul-smelling should be discarded.
Brown seeds or light browning in firm, dry eggplant flesh can be a maturity or storage change. Dark brown tissue that is water-soaked, slimy, moldy, collapsing, or foul-smelling is a different case.
Slimy or collapsing asparagus tips indicate decay. Remove an isolated damaged spear only if every other spear is firm and sound; multiple slimy tips or an off odor are reasons to discard the bunch.
Wrinkles, dry cut ends, and some flexibility usually reflect water loss and age. Sound spears are still usable; slimy tips, wet breakdown, mold, or bad odor are reasons to discard.