Spring Cleaning: Cleaning Out the Spice Rack

By Anthony Todd in Food on Apr 21, 2010 3:20PM

It's spring, and time to do some cleaning. Kitchens and pantries are full of "non-perishable" items that get kept until the dust coating them is thick enough to use for socks. Most of these items DO have a shelf life, and it's often shorter than you think. Last week, we tackled liquor - today, we'll talk about spices.

Laurie Colwin once wrote of ground dried thyme that it “tastes like a kind of bitter, powdered sawdust, and is not good for anything unless you need weird green powder for a prop.” We’re slightly more sympathetic, but we’d be willing to be that the thyme to which she was referring (a dusty jar hanging around in a boyfriend’s kitchen) was probably a few years old. At that point, it was just ‘weird green powder,’ with the probable addition of an odd smell. Our point? Spices go bad.

Lots of us tend to think of spices as non-perishable goods. They don’t look any different after a few months, we keep them tucked away in a dark corner, and they retain just enough smell that we can distinguish what they once were. Now, we’re not being the type of snobs who insist that you have to use fresh herbs in every dish - sometimes, you want to make something without much bother or expense. But, at least be sure that the dried herbs and spices that you are using are fresh and flavorful.

Rule of thumb: one year. After that, it’s time to replace it. If you haven’t used it? Time to let it go - you’re not GOING to use it. Any strange or experimental spices? Try buying them in very small quantities the first time you use it - there are lots of places around town that will let you buy spices in bulk, as much or as little as you want. Anything that you plan to grind just before use (nutmeg, peppercorns) can stand a longer wait, and salt lasts forever.