Dried Herbs and Spices

Spices do not spoil; they fade. A jar of ground cumin from five years ago is safe and tastes of nothing, which in a food store amounts to the same thing, because spice is what makes month three of beans and rice different from month two. Whole spices hold their oils for years; ground ones lose them in a year or two; dried herbs are the most fragile. The method is to buy whole, grind as you go, and keep them away from light and heat.

Whole over ground wherever there is a choice: peppercorns, cumin seed, coriander, cloves, cinnamon sticks, nutmeg, cardamom, mustard seed, whole dried chiles; a cheap grinder or a mortar does the rest. Ground for the ones that only come ground: paprika, turmeric, ginger, chili powder, garlic and onion powder. Dried herbs in small jars, replaced yearly, or grown and dried at home. The working set for a food store is salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, cumin, chili powder, paprika, oregano, cinnamon and a curry powder; those ten cover most of what gets cooked from cans and buckets. Bulk spices in sealed bags are a fraction of the jar price.

Airtight glass jars in a dark cupboard or drawer, cool, and not above the stove, where heat and steam fade them fastest. Buy bulk spices in bags, fill a small working jar, and keep the rest sealed in the dark or in the freezer, where whole spices keep their oils for years. Never shake a jar over a steaming pot; the steam goes in and the spice cakes. Dried herbs crumble when they are dry; if they bend, they have taken on moisture and will mold.

The crush test: rub a pinch between your fingers and smell. A strong, clear aroma is a good spice; a faint, dusty one is a faded spice, safe but weak, and the recipe wants twice as much. Faded color means the same. Clumping, a musty smell or any mold means moisture got in and the jar goes. Whole spices that still smell strong when cracked are fine at any age.

Spice is the flavor budget: a few ounces of the working ten per person per quarter turns the same beans into chili, curry, soup and refried beans across a month. Grind whole spices in a coffee grinder kept for the purpose or crush them in a mortar; toasting them in a dry pan for a minute first doubles the flavor of an old jar. A year's spice for a family fits in a shoebox and costs less than a case of canned meat, and it's the cheapest thing on this site that changes whether people keep eating.

Nothing changes. Spices need no cold and no cooking, and in a long outage they are the difference between food and rations.

Shelf-life figures are from the Survival Foods field guide; fridge, freezer and pantry times are from the USDA cold and pantry storage charts. Run the look, smell, taste check before eating anything past its date.