1) Once canned food goes past the recommended "eat by date" it's not that the food goes bad (Unless the can starts to
bulge) it's that the vitamin/nutrient benefit/value diminishes.
2) Each type of food's vitamin/nutrient diminishes at a different rate depending on
A) How it was cooked, and
B) The item in the can.
That is why you can not find a standard to follow. There are just to many variables involved.
The standard that MrsMac and I have used successfully is:
I) Any canned meat we keep no longer then one year past Expiration Date, and
II) Fruit & vegetables, five years. Remember that light is one of the major contributors to food loosing it's
vitamin/nutrient value. So the above standard does not include home canned items put in clear canning jars. The
maximum time I would keep jar canned meat is 12-18 months and veggies & fruit 24-30 months.
We do rotate stock and we clean out our can cupboard once a year. We give the cans away to the food bank we do not want to keep another year.
On another note:
We can a good portion of what we grow. If we do not grow enough of X we buy it from a produce wholesaler. What we strive for is:
24-30 pint jars of ea. Carrots, and green/bush/wax beans
24-30 ea plastic zip lock bags of corn and lima beans. 1 cup per bag and frozen
12-18 pint jars of peaches
24-30 pint jars of my grandmothers pasta sauce (You get about 12 pint jars per 20 #'s of tomatoes)
12-18 qt jars of pickles,
12 1/2 pint assorted jellies, and
9 qts of blue berries (3, 1 gallon ziplock bags) frozen.
Sounds like a lot for two people but it is just about right. Lasts us from ~October through April-ish. The pickles last us till August/September.
We have been given canned meat in qt jars but never tried doing it ourselves. We freeze a lot though. I figure if we loose electricity, I would just move the freezer out onto the porch in the winter. We did that in 2012/13 as we had limited electricity then.
A lot more info than you were looking for Jojo. Sorry...