I used to live somewhere where there was a grocery store that was positioned between a lower socioeconomic community and a higher one. It mostly served the lower one, but stocked specialty goods (think organic). I used to hit the dumpster every day after work, and found lots of good stuff in there. I too found a couple gallons of olive oil once. At one point my girlfriend and I went all February living off of nothing but dumpster dived food (except I think we bought some almond milk) and I remember eating fine (this was a year out of college so fine is relative). The takeaway I had was that there is all kinds of food that gets thrown out which is perfectly fine to eat. I never ate disgusting rotting food like one would picture coming out of a dumpster - everything was packaged and pretty much equivalent to what you'd take off the shelves. Also that not all dumpsters are created equal.
