Guides · 5 min read ·
The Pakistani Spice Box: The Spices You Need and How to Use Them
Which spices do you actually need for Pakistani cooking? A practical guide to the masala dabba: what each spice does, whole vs ground, and how to store them.
Open almost any Pakistani kitchen cupboard and you’ll find a round steel tin with a lid and seven small bowls inside. That’s the masala dabba, and between its bowls and a few jars on the shelf, it holds nearly everything you need to cook most of the recipes on this site.
The good news is that the list is shorter than it looks. Six spices do most of the work. Another handful appear in specific dishes. Here’s what each one does, which ones to buy first, and how to keep them tasting fresh.
The everyday six
These go into most salans, daals and sabzis. If you’re stocking a kitchen from scratch, start here.
Salt. Obvious, but worth saying: Pakistani recipes are written for ordinary table salt. If you use flaky sea salt, you’ll need a little more.
Red chili powder (lal mirch). The main source of heat. Pakistani chili powder is hotter than paprika and most Western “chili powder” blends, so if you’re buying abroad, look for it at a South Asian shop. Kashmiri chili is a separate, milder variety used mostly for colour; it’s what gives tandoori chicken and many restaurant curries their deep red.
Turmeric (haldi). Gives the yellow-gold colour and a warm, earthy bitterness. You rarely need more than half a teaspoon for a family-sized pot. Too much tastes medicinal, and it stains everything it touches.
Coriander powder (pisa dhania). Mild, slightly citrusy and the backbone of most masalas. It also thickens a gravy a little. This is the spice people most often forget, and the one whose absence you notice.
Cumin (zeera). Used two ways. Whole seeds are fried in hot oil at the start of a dish, or in a at the end. Ground cumin, especially when the seeds are dry-roasted first, goes into raita, chaat and kebabs.
Garam masala. Not a single spice but a blend: usually cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, black pepper, cumin and bay leaf. It’s added near the end of cooking, in small amounts, for aroma rather than heat. A shop-bought packet is fine to start with; our guide to homemade garam masala explains how to make your own.
With these six, plus ginger, garlic, onions, tomatoes and green chilies, you can cook chicken karahi, masoor daal, aloo gobi and dozens of other everyday dishes.
Whole spices: the second shelf
Whole spices, sabut garam masala, are fried in oil at the beginning of rice dishes, qormas and yakhni to perfume the fat. You don’t eat them; you push them aside on your plate.
- Green cardamom (chhoti elaichi): sweet and floral. Also used in chai, kheer and most desserts.
- Black cardamom (bari elaichi): large, smoky and resinous. One or two pods go into biryani and pulao.
- Cloves (laung): strong and numbing. Use three or four, never a handful.
- Cinnamon (dar chini): the papery bark sold in Pakistan is usually cassia, which is stronger than Ceylon cinnamon.
- Bay leaves (tez patta): two or three in rice and qorma.
- Black peppercorns (kali mirch): whole in pulao, freshly crushed in karahi and sajji.
For biryani and pulao, you’ll want all of these.
The specialists
A few spices only turn up in particular dishes, but those dishes don’t taste right without them.
| Spice | Urdu | Where you’ll meet it |
|---|---|---|
| Ajwain (carom seeds) | اجوائن | Pakora batter, fish fry, parathas |
| Kalonji (nigella seeds) | کلونجی | Achar, naan, achar gosht |
| Saunf (fennel seeds) | سونف | Achar gosht, some nihari blends, after-meal mukhwas |
| Methi dana (fenugreek seeds) | میتھی دانہ | Pickles, achari dishes |
| Kasuri methi (dried fenugreek leaves) | قصوری میتھی | Butter chicken, aloo methi, Lahori dishes |
| Anardana (dried pomegranate seeds) | انار دانہ | Chana chaat, chapli kebab |
| Amchur (dried mango powder) | امچور | Chaat, bhindi, sour dry sabzis |
| Kala namak (black salt) | کالا نمک | Chaat, raita, shikanjvi |
Whole or ground?
Ground spices lose their aroma quickly, often within a few months. Whole spices last a year or more. That doesn’t mean you need to grind everything yourself, but it’s worth doing for the spices that matter most in a dish.
Cumin is the easiest place to start. Dry-roast a few tablespoons of seeds in a pan over low heat until they darken slightly and smell toasty, about two minutes, then crush them in a mortar or a spice grinder. Roasted ground cumin is a different, deeper spice from the shop-bought powder, and it transforms raita, chaat and kebabs.
Black pepper is the other one. Ready-ground pepper tastes of very little; crushed fresh, it gives black pepper chicken and karahi their bite.
Blooming: why spices go in when they do
Spices release most of their flavour into fat, not water. That’s why Pakistani recipes fry whole spices in oil at the start and cook the ground spices with tomatoes and onions until the oil separates, the stage called . Spices added straight into simmering water taste flat and raw.
Ground spices burn easily, though. If you’re adding powdered spices to hot oil, splash in a tablespoon of water at the same time, or add them together with tomatoes, so they cook without scorching.
Storing spices so they last
Light, heat and air are what dull spices. Keep them in airtight jars or the closed masala dabba, away from the stove’s heat and out of direct sunlight. Buy ground spices in small packets and refill often rather than keeping a big tub for a year. A simple test: rub a pinch between your fingers. If you can barely smell it, it’s time to replace it.
One practical tip for humid cities like Karachi: never put a wet spoon into a spice jar. Moisture makes ground spices clump and go mouldy, especially chili powder and coriander.
A first shopping list
If you’re starting from nothing, this list will cover most of the recipes on this site:
- Salt, red chili powder, turmeric, coriander powder
- Cumin seeds (roast and grind some yourself)
- Garam masala
- Whole: green cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, bay leaves, black peppercorns
- Kashmiri chili powder and kasuri methi, for restaurant-style dishes
- Ajwain and chaat masala, for snacks and street food
Add the rest as you come across recipes that need them. A good next step is chana masala, which uses nearly every spice in the everyday six and shows how they work together.
