Spices · Profile
List of Herbs and Spices: Every SPICEography Profile, A to Z by Type
Looking for a spice by name, or wondering whether something counts as an herb at all? Here’s every herb, spice and blend on SPICEography, grouped by type and listed A to Z, with links to each one’s substitutes, storage, cooking and “too much” pages where we have them. The herb-or-spice line is blurrier than you’d think: on a US ingredient label, thyme can be a “spice” while garlic powder isn’t. After the ingredient tables, you’ll find guides by cuisine and by dish.
Herb or spice?
There’s no single dividing line. Britannica treats spices and herbs together as plant parts grown for their aromatic, pungent or otherwise desirable substances, taken from rhizomes, bulbs, barks, flower buds, stigmas, fruits, seeds and leaves, and notes they’re commonly split into spices, spice seeds and herbs.1 In everyday cooking, herbs are leaves and the rest are spices. That’s everyday usage, not a formal rule, and it’s how this list is sorted.
US labeling law draws the line somewhere else. The FDA defines “spice” as any aromatic vegetable substance, whole, broken or ground, whose significant function in food is seasoning rather than nutrition, and its examples include leafy herbs like basil, bay leaves, marjoram, oregano, parsley, rosemary, sage, tarragon and thyme. The same rule leaves out onions, garlic and celery, because they’ve traditionally been regarded as foods.2 So on a US ingredient label, thyme can be a “spice” while garlic powder isn’t.
How to use this list
- Find a profile: names link to the full page.
- Related pages: where we have them, each row links to substitutes, a “too much” fix, storage and freezing guides, and cooking or uses pages.
- Blends have their own table. Their ingredients vary by maker, so each blend’s page shows named recipes or labels side by side.
- Storage for any dried spice: see how long can spices last?, do spices go bad? and the best containers for spices.
Herbs
Spices: seeds, barks, berries, roots and flowers
Chiles and chile powders
Garlic, onion, ginger and other pungent aromatics
Salts
Blends and seasonings
Other seasonings
| Name | Related pages |
|---|---|
| Monosodium glutamate | |
| Soy sauce powder | |
| Vanilla | too much |
| Vanilla sugar | substitutes · uses |
| Vinegar powder | |
| Worcestershire powder |
Spices by cuisine and region
Australian, Brazilian, Caribbean, Chilean, Cuban, Egyptian, Ethiopian, French, German, Haitian, Hungarian, Indian, Italian, Jamaican, Japanese, Korean, Mediterranean, Moroccan, Nigerian, Peruvian, Polish, Portuguese, South African, Spanish, Thai, Tunisian.
Spices for particular dishes
Baked potato, Beef stew, Clam chowder, Cornbread, Corned beef and cabbage, Cranberry sauce, Curry, Eggplant, French onion soup, French toast, Green bean casserole, Gyro, Hash brown, Hot dog, Hummus, Jambalaya, Kale, Korean BBQ, Lobster, Minestrone soup, Mushroom, Oatmeal, Okra, Paella, Pancake, Pot roast, Potato soup, Pumpkin seed, Pumpkin soup, Roasted beet, Split pea soup, Stuffing, Sweet potato, Tomato soup, Tortilla soup, Turkey gravy, Vegetable soup.
More guides
- Must-have spices: a starter spice rack
- Winter spice rack: must-have spices for cold days
- Thanksgiving herbs and spices
- Christmas spices
- The best salt for cooking
- Types of mint
- The most expensive spices and why saffron is so expensive
- Is ginger spicy?, is curry powder spicy?, is cinnamon good for your skin?
- Herbs for inflammation and spices and herbs for weight loss
Footnotes
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“Spice and herb”, Encyclopaedia Britannica. britannica.com · Reference work ↩
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21 CFR 101.22, Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (FDA). ecfr.gov · Regulator ↩