Things I am not going to buy - Day 15: Indian spices

I love curry, and so do DH and DS.  So much, in fact, that we have a curry every Friday night - sometimes we go out, but usually we have one at home, along with a bottle of wine to celebrate the end of the week (DS doesn't have any wine of course!). 

I really like home made curry, and I like the fact that it can be made more a lot more healthy than a restaurant version where they tend to overuse the oil, and underuse vegetables.  Every now and again I get this crazy idea that I will make a curry feast, and get out my pile of Indian cook books to look at the lovely pictures of all the delicious dishes I plan to prepare.  Off I go to the specialist shops, armed with a HUGE list of all the spices I need - I have even been known to buy whole spices, fully intending to roast and grind them so that the flavour is fresher.  Sometimes, I even get around to cooking an Indian meal from scratch!  I slave away for hours grinding spices and making about 3 or 4 different dishes, plus rice, raitas, naans, etc (I have never actually made my own naans, even though it is apparently "very easy").  The dishes usually turn out to be delicious, and if I'm not cooking for other people, there is usually plenty left to freeze for another day.  However, once I have done all this slaving away, that's it!  I'm not going to attempt it for another few more years.  I can't tell you how many times I have come across lots of little containers of spices in the back of the cupboard that are about 6 months past their "use by" date.  Whilst no-one would die if they were used, the flavour would not be very fresh, so they all go into the bin. 

Cooking curries is another thing to add to the list of "things I will do more of when I'm retired".  I have to admit defeat for now, and not buy any more spices to go off in my cupboard (they smell nice when emptied into the food waste bin tho;!).