What’s the best way to store and use up spices?
Grace, Sheffield
We all have those trusty spices that we reach for time and again to bring flavour – Heat! Sweetness! Sourness! – to a dish, but there are also those that lurk at the back, unused and unloved. To prevent Grace’s cupboard from becoming a Bart’s history museum (other brands are available), she’s right to ask how best to store them.
While supermarkets sell spices in jars, it’s best not to keep them this way. “They’ll lose their potency, which is really the singular point of a spice,” says Rachel Walker, founder of Rooted Spices and co-author, alongside Esther Clark, of The Modern Spice Rack. Instead, store them in an opaque container out of direct sunlight and away from heat. “You don’t want them too close to the oven,” she adds, “but equally, if they are tucked away at the back of a cupboard, that’s when you’ll start to forget they exist.” This strategy is also endorsed by Cynthia Shanmugalingam, chef/founder of Rambutan in Borough Market, London, who keeps her “embarrassingly huge spice collection” in airtight containers in a cool, dark cupboard. Her top tip, though, is to buy whole spices and a decent small electric spice grinder: “The difference between toasting and grinding your spices fresh is huge.” Plus, they’ll keep longer (typically 12 months, as opposed to six for ground spices). So, in future, buy whole spices little and often.
But back to Grace’s predicament. One of the great joys of spices, Clark says, is that they allow you to be a more thrifty cook: “They inject so much flavour.” Coriander seeds, for example, could be toasted and used to top dips and salads, or crushed and whisked into dressings, while Shanmugalingam tempers cumin seeds in olive oil and adds them to hummus, roast carrots, dal, pumpkin curry and even rice as it boils. Fish cooked with coconut milk, tomatoes, turmeric, fenugreek, black pepper and curry leaves is a breakfast Shanmugalingam “could eat every day”, while surplus cardamom might go into a buttermilk brine for chicken. Another option, Clark adds, is to combine paprika and butter to rub under chicken skin.
Variety is, of course, the spice of life, so don’t be afraid to experiment: “Spices you bought for something savoury might also apply well to sweet things,” Clark says. She often toasts fennel seeds in butter to drizzle over a tahini-yoghurt dip, but you could also crush them to macerate strawberries in with lemon and sugar – those berries will then work like a dream whizzed up for a cocktail or churned into ice-cream.
And remember, you don’t always have to finish a dish with salt and pepper. “Taste and smell your spices, get to know them, and use them as a seasoning,” Clark suggests. “Have a za’atar pinch pot on your table and put some on your scrambled eggs.” Essentially, it’s about those daily uses. Walker, for example, deploys shichimi togarashi on cheese on toast and grated nutmeg on buttered crumpets (a tip from her grower). “Just play with flavours,” she says. After all, it’s bound to be more fun.
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