Label those lids!

With the holidays upon us, I wanted to share a helpful tip for keeping track of rarely-used ingredients.  So often exotic and unusual spices and seasonings are purchased for holiday baking, only to be confined to the back of the cabinet for the rest of the year.  Write the month and year of when you first opened or bought those bottles, so that you can see at a glance just how old the spice/seasoning is before using it in a recipe. 

After all, the cream of tartar works much better when it hasn't aged out of usefulness.  Spices do not have an unlimited shelf life, and it's nice to know if the cardamom you're about to put into that cookie recipe is from 2010 or 1996. 

I started labelling the lids this summer, and it's been a huge help. Not only do I know when I opened something, but now I can also gauge how fast I go through something.  Example: if I'm plowing through an 8 oz. bottle of clear vanilla extract in three months, then I should consider buying more when they are on sale, or purchasing a larger size.  Like in a five-gallon bucket.  Just sayin'.

Happy baking!