A lot has been going on in our house lately. I haven’t been posting like I should in the past week.  It started out with the whole episode with the scavenger debt collector.  I have been so furious with that whole situation that in my spare time I started deep cleaning my house.   It’s one of my little stress relievers.

Last Saturday, I went on a cleaning frenzy. I was either putting laundry in to wash and dry as soon as the machines stopped or I was bleaching counters and floors or I was moving furniture and vacuuming under it or I was flipping the mattresses over.  In the process of doing all this, I pulled a muscle in my thigh and have been barely able to walk or sit down until Thursday.   Enough of all that…

Now for Today’s Helpful Tip Saturday.  Did you know….

Array of Spices

Spices have a shelf life. The average shelf life for dried and ground spices is about 6 months.  The average shelf life for whole spices is about 1 year.  This is just the average.  It varies.  Some companies will tell you that the spices are good as long as they have flavor and you can smell them when you open the container.

Spices should be stored in a cool place. I keep mine next to the stove in one of my cabinets.  Do not store your spices in front of a light source or in a humid place.

Spices

Keep your spices together in the same cupboard. Don’t have them stored all over the place and have multiples of the same spice.

Date the bottle of spice when you open it. This way you won’t be trying to guess when you bought it and opened it and you’ll be able to calculate it’s shelf life better.

Don’t wait until you actually need the spice to see if the spice is any good. For example, smell that sage that’s been in your cabinet for forever before you actually need to use it in dressing.  Nothing is worse than having your hands in cornbread dressing and realizing that your sage is not “sagey” enough!!!

These are some of the tips that I have found about spices. Did you know that spices have a shelf life?  I had never thought about it.  Spices are not one of those things that I have been rotating in and out of my pantry.  All of my spices are well over a year old.  It’s time for me to replace them because some of them I can’t remember when I bought them.

Do you have any spice tips?  Please post them in our comments section.  We look forward to seeing some of your tips.  If you liked this Saturday’s Helpful Tips and don’t want to miss future updates, please sign up for our RSS feed or our email feeds.

Till next time,

JT Locke

The Frugal Housewife

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