Pumpkin spice is here again…. and again…. and again…… Are you ready to be done with this omnipresent spice? It has been around for years! In 1798, the book, American Cookery, offered two pumpkin pie recipes, with slightly different spice variations, but featuring nutmeg, allspice, and ginger. In the 1930s McCormick’s spice company started selling premade spice blends as “pumpkin pie spice.”

Starbucks and PSL

People have been putting cinnamon, cloves, and other such spices in their java for centuries so Starbucks was not the first to bring us Pumpkin Spice Latte!   In fact when Starbucks developed their PSL in 2003, they almost called it Fall Harvest Latte!

Starbucks Almost Called Its PSL Fall Harvest!

Once Starbucks settled on a name, they found a gold mine.  Seasonal pumpkin products annually bring in a cool $800 million. Loyal Starbucks customers return every year for the autumn ritual, but most customers limit their purchase to one or two PSLs each year. According to data from 2015, the vast majority of pumpkin spice purchasers (72%) have just one per year; 20% have two. It’s only the die-hard fans, the remaining 8%, who have a PSL three or more times in a year.

Starbucks Reworked Its PSL to Include Pumpkin! 

This spice blend is intended to spice pumpkin and, similarly, the PSL only referred to the seasoning in the beginning. Many pumpkin spice-flavored things don’t contain pumpkin — just cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, and sometimes allspice. But after Starbucks reworked its recipe in 2015, they added squash to their PSL (specifically kabocha) and removed artificial flavors and coloring. Pumpkin puree is currently the third ingredient in the chain’s Pumpkin Spice Sauce, right behind sugar and condensed skim milk.

PSL Arrives Sooner Every Year

Pumpkin Spice Comes Earlier and Earlier! You are not imagining it!  Things filled with this autumnal spice are appearing on the shelves earlier and earlier.  Starbucks introduced PSL for the very first time on October 10, 2003 but the PSL appeared this year on August 22! Not to be outdone,  Dunkin’ launched its 2023 (pumpkin-less) PSL on August 16 and 7-Eleven rolled theirs out on August 1.    (I haven’t even taken my “summer vacation” by August 1!)

When Pumpkin Spice Shut Down a School!

In October 2017, students and teachers at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Baltimore noticed a strange smell that was getting stronger. After some people reported difficulty breathing, the school president evacuated the building and called the fire department. The hazmat team arrived and discovered a plug-in pumpkin spice-scented air freshener in a third-floor classroom — perfectly safe, although perhaps overly air “freshening.”

Pumpkin Spice Is Going Wild!

I love reading about the new pumpkin spice options each year – and it gets wilder and wilder!   If you are thinking of a house warming gift or a hostess gift for a favorite friend this fall, I encourage you to skip these horrors.  So far I have found seasoned salmon, spiced smelling trash bags, pumpkin spice flavored SPAM, kitty litter which is scented with pumpkin and pumpkin spiced dog treats (really???), pumpkin spiced deodorant (is this for the farmers among us?),  pumpkin spice tamales, pumpkin spiced concrete and even pumpkin spiced toilet paper.   Enough already!  At least my least favorite spice scent will soon be replaced on the shelves by the balsam and Christmas spice candles in places like Home Goods and Michaels!

Have a wonderful fall!

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