Real history, real science, and the safety checks that keep your pantry honest — one short at a time.
Every single one. Half of them exceeded the 0.1 ppm the FDA recommends as a maximum for lead in children’s candy, and two ran up to 1,000 times it. Bright color sells, and some suppliers reach for a lead-based pigment to get it. Knowing which brands test clean is the whole game.
Sources: Cowell et al., Public Health Reports, 2017 — 32 ground-turmeric samples from Boston-area stores, all with detectable lead, 16 above the 0.1 ppm the FDA recommends as a maximum for lead in children’s candy; Forsyth et al., Environmental Research 179, 2019 — 524 samples and 152 supply-chain interviews found lead chromate adulteration in 7 of Bangladesh’s 9 major turmeric-producing districts; the pigments are 2–10% lead by weight.
See which spices to flag →The four rules, plus the spices worth flagging and the ones that check out — with the study behind each call.
No spam, no selling your address. You'll get the guide the second you sign up. How we handle it →
Not a shopping list — a verdict on everything we’ve filed: what the problem is, what form is actually worth buying, and which shorts make the case. Three of the seven entries have no product at all, because we haven’t found one we’d stand behind.
Cloves, turmeric and fenugreek — every short in one place, each with the exact thing we'd buy. Or pick your platform and follow along there.
Wondered about something in your kitchen we haven’t covered? Open a file →