The night before Thanksgiving, I walked into my house to find my mom, aunt and cousin sitting in the kitchen, dipping fingers in the pumpkin pie batter, adding more spices, and tasting again.

“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Something doesn’t taste right,” my aunt said. “Like something’s missing.”
“Well, did Mom add the sugar?” [Story forthcoming in the pie storybook!]

Everyone assured me that the sugar was properly measured and added, so I went over to the counter to give it a shot.

“Yep. Something’s not quite right.”

The pie actually turned out fine. (Add enough Cool Whip and anything tastes heavenly, right?) But later we got to thinking that maybe the spices had lost some their punch.

So my question to all you pie experts is: What’s the shelf life of spices? How do you keep them as fresh as possible? Tell me all about it in the comments!