The turmeric
Our turmeric is Lakadong, and it comes from Jowai, in the West Jaintia Hills of Meghalaya.
Lakadong is not a marketing word. It is a registered geographical indication — GI No. 741, entered in the register on 15 February 2021, with the Lakadong Turmeric Cooperative Union Limited at Jowai as registered proprietor, facilitated by the Directorate of Horticulture, Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Government of Meghalaya. It is protected in the same way as Darjeeling tea or Alphonso mangoes, because the variety and the place cannot be separated.
Lakadong turmeric grows on hill slopes in Jaintia soil, rain-fed, and is dug by hand because the terrain gives no other option. There is no combine harvester on those slopes. It is known among people who work with spice for deep colour, high curcumin and an aroma that needs no help.
We tested it before we believed it. The result was 9.53% curcumin against a legal minimum of 2.0%, with no added colour and no lead chromate. The numbers are on our Lab Results page, with the sample and report reference for anyone who wants to check.
The pepper and the moringa
Both come from the hills of Northeast India, from smallholder gardens rather than plantations, for the same reason the turmeric does: crops grown in pockets on difficult terrain are inconvenient to farm at scale and better to eat.
Drying, honestly
Drying is done the way the season allows. Sun-dried when the weather cooperates, machine-dried when it does not.
We could tell you everything is sun-dried under an open hill sun. It would read better. But a monsoon-damp lot is a spoiled lot, and no amount of romance about sunshine is worth losing a harvest to mould. When it rains, we dry it properly and say so.
Ground close to origin
Grinding, jarring and labelling all happen in Guwahati — close enough to source that the material is not sitting in transit for weeks before it is processed. It is done by hand, by women who are paid for it locally, rather than shipped to a contract packer in another state.
Glass and bamboo
Ground spice is volatile. Our black pepper carries 1.72% volatile oil, which is the entire reason black pepper is worth buying, and volatile means it leaves. A sealed glass jar holds aroma in a way a laminated pouch does not.
Glass costs more than a pouch and weighs more to ship. Bamboo is the local material, and it would be strange to source from these hills and cap the jar in plastic.
What we do not claim
We buy from a cooperative in Lakadong, not from a farm we own. We do not have equity arrangements with growers. We do not blend, bulk or colour anything, and three government lab reports say so.
Everything on this page is either a document you can look up or a number from a report. That is deliberate. The spice trade has enough poetry in it already.