Investigator Robert Webb
wrote, on May 3, 2005 (though it took us a while to post it here):
"I made 16 sandwiches which covered the variables discussed in the November 23, 2004 Slate magazine article, which said:
With a winning bid of $28,000, the online casino GoldenPalace.com won the auction for one of eBay’s most coveted oddities: a 10-year-old grilled cheese sandwich, one side of which bears the Virgin Mary’s image. The seller, Diana Duyser of Hollywood, Fla., claims that the sandwich never sprouted a single spore of mold, despite having been stored in a less-than-airtight plastic box. Is it possible for a decade-old sandwich to remain mold-free without divine intervention?
"The variables were: cheese vs. no cheese, margarine vs. no margarine, store-bought vs. bakery bread, and grilling vs. no grilling. The results were that if the sandwich had been grilled then it would, on average, mold 47 days later, if store-bought bread would have been used it would mold 27 days later and margarine added 15 days to the time to mold. Adding cheese, however, took 15 days off the time to mold. The last 3 sandwiches did not mold and are not likely to mold ever because they are rock hard."