I decided to index my herbs and spices for three reasons. The first, and let’s face it the most crucial reason is that I cannot leave my flat and therefore have started to stretch the definition of “leisure activity” to breaking point. The second was that I wanted to be able to bring an end to the annoying practice of having to unload a whole cupboard of non-perishable food stuffs because there might, just might, be another jar of cumin in there. And the third was I wanted to solve the mystery of my spice rack, which is: how can have more jars than I have space for, but not have any coriander anywhere? What herbs and spices were taking up space but not pulling their weight?
It became very clear early on that there was a runaway contender for the role of culinary bed blocker: sage. I have a staggering four jars of the stuff, bought from the summer of 2015 to the spring of 2019. I’m not, to be frank, entirely clear as to why or how this happened – there are some recipes that I once adored, but I have gone off through overuse, like this wonderful beetroot bay bourgigon by the excellent vegetarian cookbook-writer Anna Jones – but I have never really cooked with sage, and yet I have continued to buy it.
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