How to avoid ruining your dinner with stale herbs and spices

When was the last time you used your herbs and spices? Photo / 123RF

It’s time to clear out the back of the spice rack – here’s how to store and prolong the life of your jars.

Roll up your sleeves for Stir-up Sunday. But as you rummage the spice rack for nutmeg and cinnamon, plus good old mixed spice, is this the first time you’ve used them since last year?

Or when you’re reaching for the thyme to get ahead with the turkey stuffing, is it the same one you’ve had since New Labour was actually new?

You’re not alone. I’ve got a jar of “rubbed sage” that dates back to the Pyramids, or at least to a time before best-before dates. My editor tells me that Christmas comes but once a year, and that’s how often the ground cloves get an airing for the ritual half teaspoon in the pudding.

Rachel Walker, of online retailer Rooted Spices, knows well how vintage spices tend to lurk in our cupboards. When her brand of high-end spices launched in 2018, Walker ran a competition to find the oldest jar. “The winner was 1971 and it was a tin of cloves. We had pictures of spices manufactured in West Germany” so before reunification in 1989.

Opt for tins over jars

But how long do dried herbs and spices last? According to Walker, a lot depends on how they are kept. First off, avoid storing them in glass jars in the light. “Part of the inspiration for setting up Rooted Spices was from my grandfather’s spice rack. It was this amazing relic right by his kitchen window – and the oven – all in glass jars so they’d all got sun bleached … just turned the exact same shade of beige.”

Pale spices will have a washed-out flavour too so Walker advises using tins for storage instead, and finishing them within two to three years. “I have spices prominently in my kitchen and not tucked away at the back of a cupboard. Then you start to get into the habit of using them more.”

Some chefs replace ground spices weekly. Photo / 123RF

Replace them regularly

Chefs take a tougher stance. Luke Selby at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons in Oxfordshire tells me that they replace ground spices weekly – counsel of perfection maybe, but a bit extreme for a home kitchen. Maria Elia, sometime chef at Delfina in London, who now cooks feasts for her supper club in Suffolk, reckons six months is fine, before the “heady and sweet and earthy” scent of cinnamon, say, is lost.

Keep them whole

Whole spices last much longer than ground. When I interviewed Madhur Jaffrey, I asked how long, to be told firmly: “As long as you buy whole spices, they last almost forever.” Grind them in a coffee grinder, although be careful with cinnamon, which I know from bitter experience may burn out the motor if you have a hard batch, or thick cassia bark (which is often sold as cinnamon). A fine grater is a better bet.

Elia is more circumspect than Jaffrey. “I think the bigger the seed, the longer it lasts. Fennel and coriander seed can go stale, but nutmeg you can get away with keeping much longer.” She loves spices from Ren’s Kitchen. “I don’t usually buy spices from the supermarket,” she adds, “but when I do I check the best before date” choosing a jar with plenty of time, a year at least, left to run.

Spices last much longer when stored in the freezer. Photo / 123RF

Zip and freeze

The advice from chef Theo Randall, a Saturday Kitchen regular with an Italian restaurant in London’s Intercontinental Hotel, is to put dried herbs in zip lock plastic bags, “then label them, keep them in a box in the cupboard, filed away like in a library”. Bags are better than jars, he says, because you can squeeze out the air when you seal them. They should last for a good six months like that. For spices, he takes the same approach, decanting them into plastic bags, but stored in the freezer, where they’ll last much longer – a year or more. “Just scoop out a spoonful when you need it – they stay dry in the bag.”

Waste not, want not

If you suspect that your spices are past their best, smell and taste them before using, says Elia, as they should be “really punchy”, and at a pinch add extra. “If it’s old you are probably going to have to add four tablespoonfuls instead of two.” Some, though, may be too bitter or flat. As Elia says: “They add so much magic to a dish – you’ve spent all that money on ingredients, why ruin it with stale herbs and spices?” I’m off to take a whiff of that rubbed sage.

Failing that, the internet is awash with tips for using past-their-best spices, including sprinkling them on the carpet before vacuuming, which sounds like a high-risk strategy, especially for that notorious stainer turmeric. Adding them to a bowl of potpourri feels like a safer bet, or play on their anti-microbial qualities and use them to dust out a whiffy bin.