What follows is not a wall of praise. It is a record of where our spices come from, how they are dried and milled, and how home cooks in South Africa actually use them. Batch notes, cooperative names, and the occasional complaint about grind coarseness all belong here.
Everything on this page describes how we source, mill and pack spices for orders placed through this shop. It is not a certification, a laboratory report or a guarantee that a specific batch will taste identical to the last one. Spices are agricultural goods, and the honest version of that is worth stating plainly.
Batch notes list the month the chilies, korarima or besobela were harvested and how they were dried. Two batches of berbere from the same cooperative can still differ in colour and bite, because rainfall and drying weather change year to year. We publish the note so you can see which run you received, not to imply every run is interchangeable.
Medium grind for berbere, fine for mitmita, whole korarima unless you ask otherwise. Once a pouch is milled and sealed, we cannot re-grind it. If a recipe calls for a finer texture, work it in a mortar at home rather than expecting the pouch to behave like a powder.
Bird's eye chili varies. A mitmita pouch that reads sharp to one cook may read mild to another, and we do not publish Scoville figures because we do not measure them per batch. Taste a small amount before adding it to kitfo or tibs.
When we say Gondar, Wolkite or the Rift Valley, we mean the growing area and the cooperative mills we buy through. Individual smallholder plots change between seasons, so we do not attach a farm name to a pouch unless that lot came from one grower.
The doro wat, misir wot and kitfo cards that ship with most orders describe how we cook at home. Quantities assume a certain pot size and simmering time. Adjust salt, onion and niter kibbeh to your own kitchen; the card is a starting point.
The 100g, 250g and 500g pouches close tightly and keep aroma steady for months when stored cool and dark. They are not vacuum-sealed indefinitely, and ground spices fade faster than whole ones. Buy the size you will finish.
If a batch note is missing from your order, or a pouch arrived with a damaged seal, write to info@ethiospices.com or call +27(24)2599624. We can confirm what was milled and when.
Reviews here come from people who ordered a blend, cooked with it, and wrote back. We keep them close to the batch notes, because the useful part is usually the detail: how the grind behaved in niter kibbeh, whether the heat landed where they wanted it, how the pouch held up over a few months.
Berbere, 250g
I ordered the medium grind for doro wat and it bloomed fast in the pan without turning bitter. The batch note said the chilies were dried on raised mats in Gondar, and you can taste the difference against the supermarket stuff. Second pouch already on the shelf.
Selam A., Johannesburg
Mitmita, 100g
I use mitmita mostly for kitfo and tibs, so the fine grind matters more than anything. This one coats the meat evenly instead of sitting in clumps. Hot, but it still tastes like korerima and clove underneath, not just chili.
Dawit M., Cape Town
Starter Bundle
I had never cooked Ethiopian food before and did not want to buy five separate bags. The bundle covered berbere, mitmita, shiro and whole korarima, and the recipe cards walked me through misir wot step by step. The shiro powder made a quick weeknight dinner possible.
Nadia P., Pretoria
Shiro powder, 500g
We cook shiro most weeks, so the 500g pouch is the sensible size for us. The resealable top actually holds, which was not true of the last brand I tried. Grind is consistent from pouch to pouch, and the batch notes tell you which mill it came from.
Hanna T., Durban
Mixed cart order
I ordered berbere, besobela and tikur azmud together and picked a coarser grind for the berbere. Everything arrived in one box with the recipe cards, and the heat level I chose was respected. Repeat orders are easy because the cart keeps the sizes I usually buy.
Yonas B., Johannesburg
Gift set
Sent a gift set to my sister who lives abroad and cooks a lot. She said the korarima was noticeably fresher than what she finds locally, and the harvest month on the label helped her plan how to store it. Nothing flashy in the packaging, which I preferred.
Meron K., Stellenbosch
References on this page are not testimonials we wrote for ourselves. They are the batch notes, mill records and grower relationships that sit behind every pouch we send out.
Berbere chilies come from smallholder plots around Gondar, mitmita from Wolkite, korarima and besobela through Rift Valley cooperatives. Each batch note lists the harvest month and drying method, so you can trace what changed between one order and the next.
We mill in small runs rather than holding pallets of pre-ground powder. That is why grind coarseness is printed on the pouch: medium for berbere that needs to bloom in niter kibbeh, fine for mitmita that has to coat kitfo evenly.
The 100g, 250g and 500g formats are built for kitchens where a pouch gets opened twice a week. A zip seal and a flat base keep the aroma steady between cooking sessions, which matters more than any shelf-life claim.
Most orders ship with cards for doro wat, misir wot and kitfo. They assume you already have onions, oil and time, and they tell you which blend to reach for first instead of leaving you to guess.
The cart handles blends, whole spices, gift sets and repeat orders in one go. If you cook kitfo often and doro wat rarely, you can size each pouch differently instead of buying matching bags you will not finish.
If you have never cooked Ethiopian food, the starter bundle gathers berbere, mitmita, shiro powder and whole korarima in 100g pouches. It is the same sourcing as our single blends, just sized so nothing sits unused in a cupboard.
Want the full catalog before you decide? Browse our offerings or get in touch with questions about a specific batch.