Making The Most Out Of Your Spice Collection – Day 12

It was happening every time to me. I would need a spice to finish off a meal I was making and it would never fail – it seemed like it would take me eons to find the spice I needed. All I needed was oregano!

Some homes have neatly organized spice racks on their counters, but I have to admit, our counter space just doesn’t have the room for it. We also do not have a nice door that they can hang on where I can face them all perfectly forward in alphabetical order. And those are just a few ways to organize your spices.

When those two options are not options, or you have too many spices to even fit on your spice rack, think about resorting to THIS option below:

Find

Get all of your spices out. This may be the time to realize that though a spice rack is great for decorating a kitchen counter, is it really worth the space that it takes up? Also, in finding all of your spices, decide whether it is worth keeping. When was the last time you used it? I know many meals call for random spices, but is there an alternative you can use to replace the one spice you use every couple of years?

Check Expiration Dates

Believe it or not, spices do expire. Do I always go by the expiration date? No, I don’t, and maybe I should. Though I have had some that have become hard and couldn’t break apart – I knew that it was then time to get rid of it (I know, pretty pathetic, huh?)

Label The Spices

This is where you could do it one of two ways. Either you can buy little circle stickers (that you use to price garage sale items) and write the name of the spice on it and adhere. The method I now use is even simpler. I bought a silver Sharpie and wrote the name of each spice on the top of each corresponding spice. What I love about this is that when I get a new spice or replace one, it is easy to label and very easy to read.

Organize

I like to keep my spices in alphabetical order so that they are easy to find. To each their own though!

How do you organize your spices? Do you find that you have many that you no longer use? Of course there are some spices that I go through more quickly than others, but some I just find not worth keeping. For instance, like steak seasoning. There are many alternatives or homemade spice recipes that I can use instead of keeping this spice around.