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A couple of years ago I got 2 packets of flour to let go out of date, to see if they would be usable after 1 year and 2 years. These flours have not received any special storage conditions they have been stored as I brought in there bags put in a kitchen cabinet.
As a recap the first one was 1 year out of date, perfect good bread.

On to this years experiment 2 years out of date. On opening the bag no sign of weevils which is a good start, it smelled of flour and looked like flour. Mixing the dough and leaving it to raise (I should point out I also make another loaf with in date flour to compare with) I did notice that it did not rise as much as the other loaf, but it did rise. After cooking both loafs looked the same and smelt the same.
Cutting into the loaf it cut well producing crumbs, the texture looked and felt the same and by god it tasted the same.
So I would feel happy using out of date flour in the future. Hope this helps so with there preps,

The flour was allinsons strong bread flour.

Good practical post UKs as per usual many thanks.

Nice one uks! Very helpful post.
I pop mine into a screw top blue barrel which is kept in a cool dark room, so could last longer still.

I have used 5-year-old "all-purpose" flour in which the paper bags were placed inside a plastic bag which was then vacuum-sealed, with an oxygen absorber placed inside the package between the original paper bag and the vacuum-sealed over wrap. I have also used paper bagged flour which was loosely wrapped in a.plastic grocery sack and stored in the freezer for up to 2 years. Longer than that the flour took on a "freezer" odor. Probably safe to use, but not as appetizing.

This was just in the bags they came in no special wrapping CH.

The bags placed in the freezer were just loosely wrapped over their original paper bags, and carried from the car direct to the pantry freezer, simply tying the handles of the grocery sack closed.

The bags stored at household ambient temperature were vacuum sealed in a food storage bag, placing an oxygen absorber between the paper grocery store packaging and the vacuum sealed outer wrapper, these being stored on an open shelf in a dark cellar with cased canned goods. This method worked best.