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It most definitely does have a smell. It smells like flour.
Damn straight it does, and the smell is pleasantly mild. Any hint of rancidness is not normal.
And what’s with all the comments about bugs in the flour? If the flour did not contain them upon opening the bag, store them in sealed containers. That also keeps moisture from ruining the flour.
So far, I have not found any visible contamination in any flour I bought. One of the flours is milled right in my county, trucked out of a building within 2 miles from the local supermarkets. I don’t think the stuff sits around for long, because it is so popular here. The other flour I use, whole wheat, comes from OR. The bag I bought last week has a Best By date of June 2023–more than a year and a half away. Once I open it, it will be stored in a sealed container, as usual.
Another thought. Disgusting as it sounds, a dried, pulverized dead bug in flour that escapes your notice probably does no harm to you. It is DEAD, it gets baked, and your digestive acids further disarm bad stuff. Have you ever read how much “insect parts” is allowed in commercial peanut butter? Worry more about if your cat or dog gets paws inside the flour. Bacteria in too-humid flour...
It most definitely does have a smell. It smells like flour.
Okay...it is practically odorless. Really very little smell - at all. I recently had a bag of old flour, it was perhaps 1.5 years old, and I opened it and compared it to a brand new bag. HUGE difference, and to my pretty dang sensitive nose, the new bag was really quite odorless. After a few months, flour will start to have an odor, and that is a sign that the flour is getting old. Eventually, that smell will get worse, and then the flour turns rancid.
And what’s with all the comments about bugs in the flour? If the flour did not contain them upon opening the bag, store them in sealed containers. That also keeps moisture from ruining the flour.
They are not visible when opening the bag.
Flour beetles feed on the broken bits and dust from grain that collect in bags of grains, flour, cereal, and pasta. The pests usually get inside packaging at warehouses or grocery stores and are then brought into homes inside these infested products. From there, flour beetles may spread to other pantry goods
Professionals advise between 1 - 2 years. Certainly NOT "forever".
All varieties of flour should be stored in clean, air-tight containers in a cool, dry location. Storing flour in the refrigerator or freezer can extend the shelf life of the product, up to about one year.
Any white flour, like all-purpose or self-rising flours, stored at room temperature should be discarded after three months; if stored at a cooler house temp, it can last six months. In a fridge, the flour has one year, and in the freezer, it has two.
Whole-wheat or whole-grain flours have more of the natural oils that can spoil, so discard after one month at regular room temp, three months at cooler house temp, six months in fridge, or one year in the freezer.
Different types of flour spoil at different rates, but a freezer will increase the lifespan of all of them. Expect your standard all-purpose flour to keep for two years when frozen versus eight months in the pantry. Whole wheat flour can stick around for a full year in the freezer, but only for a few months in your pantry
And what’s with all the comments about bugs in the flour? If the flour did not contain them upon opening the bag, store them in sealed containers. That also keeps moisture from ruining the flour.
The bug usually aren't in the flour you buy but the eggs can be.
I've eaten enough bugs in my life camping and motorcycling not to have a fit about it and if times got hard - no problem. But I'd rather not.
Bugs in food. They actually have standards for how many they will allow. Makes me laugh (uneasily.)
I once checked an old container of pepper in the cupboard and it was full of living teensy, weensy spiders.
The bug usually aren't in the flour you buy but the eggs can be.
I've eaten enough bugs in my life camping and motorcycling not to have a fit about it and if times got hard - no problem. But I'd rather not.
Bugs in food. They actually have standards for how many they will allow. Makes me laugh (uneasily.)
I once checked an old container of pepper in the cupboard and it was full of living teensy, weensy spiders.
I guess that’s reason to always aerate the flour with bare fingers before using it! Or sifting, if the recipe calls for that.
My biggest food-pest fear is about finding not just a worm in an apple I bite into, but a piece of the worm. Ewwwwwwwww.
We have several pounds of recently picked apples from an unsprayed tree. Every apple got categorized as unbroken or holey. Bruises don’t matter. But the holey ones will be carefully cut to remove the violated part.
Yeah, I know that some people on the planet deliberately eat worms.
Professionals advise between 1 - 2 years. Certainly NOT "forever".
All varieties of flour should be stored in clean, air-tight containers in a cool, dry location. Storing flour in the refrigerator or freezer can extend the shelf life of the product, up to about one year.
Any white flour, like all-purpose or self-rising flours, stored at room temperature should be discarded after three months; if stored at a cooler house temp, it can last six months. In a fridge, the flour has one year, and in the freezer, it has two.
Whole-wheat or whole-grain flours have more of the natural oils that can spoil, so discard after one month at regular room temp, three months at cooler house temp, six months in fridge, or one year in the freezer.
Different types of flour spoil at different rates, but a freezer will increase the lifespan of all of them. Expect your standard all-purpose flour to keep for two years when frozen versus eight months in the pantry. Whole wheat flour can stick around for a full year in the freezer, but only for a few months in your pantry
Our house must be one of the cold ones. The whole wheat flour stays good longer than even 3 months. I keep it in sealed containers on the floor, which is cooler than up on a shelf. And it gets no direct sunlight.
I do try to use up all the flour by summer, but this last batch was opened in spring and just now finished. It smelled, baked, and tasted fine right up to the end.
Still, I would not count on the flour being good for 6 months at room temp. If it has any off smells regardless of age, it gets tossed.
I certainly would not stockpile it or baking powder. Yeast can be refrigerated (I do) but probably not “forever.”
Flour beetles feed on the broken bits and dust from grain that collect in bags of grains, flour, cereal, and pasta. The pests usually get inside packaging at warehouses or grocery stores and are then brought into homes inside these infested products. From there, flour beetles may spread to other pantry goods
Sounds delicious!!
I’ve got some gold medal flour … in the back of the cupboard
At least .. 8 yrs old .
I should dig it out if it’s full of these creepy crawlers…, makes
Some fried dough
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Air Tight container or lots of plastic bags ...
