Are these Ingredients too Old to use?

Hi, Im new here. I am working on my second batch and have a question. I recently purchased some new equiptment on a local classified ad site for 50.00 it was a Pale ale fermentor, glass carboy, wing capper,hydromoter, cleaner, mics cleanining brushes and a ingredient kit. I think the kit is from 2007. but everything looks brand new.
Ingredient kit is 7lbs of united canadian dark malt extract (liquid), 1.5 oz perle hops and unmarked specialty grains and packet of nottingham yeast.

the grains are as dark as coffe and I wish I knew more about what they are. If anyone can give some input on identifying grains would appreciate it.

The yeast packet say's use by aug 2007. and today is Nov 2012. I have to assume this kit is 5 years old. I have 2 options right now. throw it away or practice with it.

I'd like to hear your comments on what I should do! from what ive read the dark malt is best used for dark beers such as brown ales, porters, and stouts.

please help me out here!

I would replace them.

Why waste the time and effort and wait that long to find out if it's going to be drinkable when it doesn't cost that much to know you are making good beer.

i would brew it... why throw it away?

get in a little practice with all your techniques, and after you bottle, stick it in a corner for a month.

what have you got to lose besides a few hours of time doing the brewing?

if you throw everything away then you know what you've got, which is nothing.

Update on my old ingredients. By the time I had read everyones response. it was done cooking and I had added the yeast. that was saturday at about 4 pm. by monday at 10 am (42 hours later) no active bubleing from the air lock. I opened it and there ws no activity. I called Art at arts brew supplies in Salt lake and he told me to add a packet of fresh yeast. So I added a packet of fresh dry ale yeast. I did this by boiling a cup of water and letting it cool down to 90 degrees. added the yeast and 10 minutes lated added that to the wort. The wort was about 72 degrees. Now 10 hours later I see no bubbles, but there is some activity on top. some foam and hopefully within 24 hours It will start fermenting, lesson so far!. don't use old yeast.

So I put the new yeast in yesterday at I think was about 10 am and by 9 that night nothing was going on except some foam on top. I went to work and when I got home I couldnt hear anything, udderly dissapointed, but when Looked close I could see bubbles in the air lock. so it had started some between midnight and 9 am. I used a different air lock this time. The first was a s type and makes a burping noise. the new one on this batch is a 2 piece cylendar shaped airlock. its quieter, but I personaly like to hear the burp. anyone else had this expierience with airlocks?

As of 9 pm dec 7th no more airlock activity, Is it stuck or finished? It started to bubble on dec 05 between midnight and 9am witch would have given it 2-3 days of fermenting.

First things first, take a gravity reading. Hopefully the kit you bought came with a hydrometer. If not , your next priority should be getting one. Otherwise, you'll never know if it's done or not.

Edit: I see you said it did come with a hydrometer. So, you need to use it. The bubbling is only fun to watch, not a lot of useful information can be gathered from it.