Dried Curry Leaves

Curry leaf loses both colour and aroma quickly when dried too hot. Air-dried at controlled temperature and packed in lined cartons; even so, this is a 12-month product rather than a 24-month one and should be sold as such.

What to fix on the specification

• Colour retention: the figure that separates air-dried from over-dried.
• Stem content, as a percentage.
• Moisture and foreign matter.
• Microbiology, and the treatment if any.
• Shelf life: 12 months, not 24.

Curry leaf loses colour and aroma quickly when dried too hot, and any microbial reduction step takes more of both. Steam sterilisation and what it costs you is worth reading before specifying treatment on a leaf product.