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Arun Kapil
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‘Masale bolte hain – the spices speak’
Arun Kapil is a masaalchi, a spice master, flavour fanatic and instinctive cook. Founder of the multi-award-winning spice company Green Saffron, he’s made it his life’s work to rewire how we think about spice: fresh, direct-from-farm, full-flavoured and unapologetically bold.
Based in County Cork by way of Lincolnshire and Uttar Pradesh, Arun’s style is a sensory riot, rooted in family tradition, punk spirit and modern food smarts. He trained at the famed Ballymaloe Cookery School in Ireland in 2004, after years running club nights and managing a successful record label or two in London, discovering and promoting top talent while cooking his way through kitchens against a backdrop of late nights and loud beats. In 2007, armed with a coffee grinder, brown paper bags, and a big dream, he founded Green Saffron at Cork’s local farmers’ market. Today, Green Saffron supplies blue-chips, top chefs and restaurants across Ireland, the UK and Europe.
Arun’s philosophy is simple: Spices should sing. His blends are crafted to reveal spice at its freshest and most expressive, no shortcuts, no stale stuff, no generic jars. Just vibrant, sustainable, volatile-oil-rich masalas backed by full traceability and a mission to shake up the old spice trade.
He’s a regular on TV and radio, with appearances across BBC1 (MasterChef, Pies & Puds with Paul Hollywood), Channel 4 (Sunday Brunch, Cookery School with Richard Corrigan), regularly RTÉ1 (The Today Show) and of old UKTV (Market Kitchen), and Virgin Media (The Six O’Clock Show). He’s written for food magazines and airlines, been a question-master on BBC Radio 2’s Midnight Mastermind, and is a respected guest voice on Ireland’s Newstalk FM, Red FM, and RTÉ Radio 1.
His first book Fresh Spice (Pavilion UK, 2014) was a celebration of spice from root to plate. His forthcoming second book Jhatpat Fatafat: Indian Cooking in Ten Minutes and Other Stories (2026) explodes the idea that Indian food has to be slow or fussy. It’s poetic, irreverent, and fast, a mashup of punk flavour wisdom, literary storytelling and 10-minute masala magic.
Arun is also Food Editor for the radical arts imprint Ars Notoria, where he writes a monthly column on cooking, culture and community. He has cooked at pop-ups from Delhi to Paris, London to Belfast and a few cheeky stops in between. A member of the UK’s Guild of Food Writers, he’s become a trusted culinary voice for those seeking instinctive, honest food with spice and soul.
“Well known in food circles but still ego-free, Arun is on the rise: flavour-first and letting the work speak loudest.”
ADDENDUM: SELECTED HIGHLIGHTS (2023–2025)
Broadcast & Press
Live Events & Talks
SPICE INTEGRITY & PROVENANCE
At the heart of Arun’s work lies a simple belief: if you know where it comes from, you know how it should taste.
Green Saffron’s model is built on deep-rooted relationships with family farms across India, not just as suppliers, but as partners and core storytellers of the spice journey. This direct sourcing model isn't a trend. It's a 17-year commitment to traceability, seasonality, soil and story, a living, breathing spice route from farm to fork.
Arun and his team have pioneered a ‘Fresh Spice Gold Standard’, selecting only single-source, new-season crops with the highest volatile oil content. Every batch is traceable, Sedex-verified, and shipped within weeks of harvest. The result? Spices that arrive alive, not asleep.
In collaboration with Professor Chris Elliott and the Institute for Global Food Security at Queen’s University Belfast, Arun contributes to cutting-edge work tackling food fraud and improving spice transparency across Europe. Their shared goal: to prove the provenance of every grain, pod, and seed scientifically and sensorially.
This work places Arun at the intersection of culinary craft, agricultural ethics and academic rigour - shaping a future where spice isn’t just a kitchen essential, but a symbol of food integrity.
“We’re not just sourcing flavour. We’re rebuilding trust in one of the world’s oldest trades.” -Arun Kapil
Arun Kapil is a masaalchi, a spice master, flavour fanatic and instinctive cook. Founder of the multi-award-winning spice company Green Saffron, he’s made it his life’s work to rewire how we think about spice: fresh, direct-from-farm, full-flavoured and unapologetically bold.
Based in County Cork by way of Lincolnshire and Uttar Pradesh, Arun’s style is a sensory riot, rooted in family tradition, punk spirit and modern food smarts. He trained at the famed Ballymaloe Cookery School in Ireland in 2004, after years running club nights and managing a successful record label or two in London, discovering and promoting top talent while cooking his way through kitchens against a backdrop of late nights and loud beats. In 2007, armed with a coffee grinder, brown paper bags, and a big dream, he founded Green Saffron at Cork’s local farmers’ market. Today, Green Saffron supplies blue-chips, top chefs and restaurants across Ireland, the UK and Europe.
Arun’s philosophy is simple: Spices should sing. His blends are crafted to reveal spice at its freshest and most expressive, no shortcuts, no stale stuff, no generic jars. Just vibrant, sustainable, volatile-oil-rich masalas backed by full traceability and a mission to shake up the old spice trade.
He’s a regular on TV and radio, with appearances across BBC1 (MasterChef, Pies & Puds with Paul Hollywood), Channel 4 (Sunday Brunch, Cookery School with Richard Corrigan), regularly RTÉ1 (The Today Show) and of old UKTV (Market Kitchen), and Virgin Media (The Six O’Clock Show). He’s written for food magazines and airlines, been a question-master on BBC Radio 2’s Midnight Mastermind, and is a respected guest voice on Ireland’s Newstalk FM, Red FM, and RTÉ Radio 1.
His first book Fresh Spice (Pavilion UK, 2014) was a celebration of spice from root to plate. His forthcoming second book Jhatpat Fatafat: Indian Cooking in Ten Minutes and Other Stories (2026) explodes the idea that Indian food has to be slow or fussy. It’s poetic, irreverent, and fast, a mashup of punk flavour wisdom, literary storytelling and 10-minute masala magic.
Arun is also Food Editor for the radical arts imprint Ars Notoria, where he writes a monthly column on cooking, culture and community. He has cooked at pop-ups from Delhi to Paris, London to Belfast and a few cheeky stops in between. A member of the UK’s Guild of Food Writers, he’s become a trusted culinary voice for those seeking instinctive, honest food with spice and soul.
“Well known in food circles but still ego-free, Arun is on the rise: flavour-first and letting the work speak loudest.”
ADDENDUM: SELECTED HIGHLIGHTS (2023–2025)
Broadcast & Press
- Disney / Hulu (June 2025) – Invited spice expert for launch of Washington Black; custom blends, spice demos, live guest experience.
- RTÉ1 The Today Show (May 2025) – Two appearances (Season 13, 12 shows across Sep 2023–Apr 2024).
- Newstalk FM (May 2025) – Guest on national radio with Brendan O’Connor.
- RTÉ Radio 1 – Interviews on Countrywide with Philip Boucher (Dec 2023), Brendan O’Connor Show (Apr 2024), and spicy salad segment.
- BBC Radio 2 – Midnight Mastermind guest question master (Jan & Nov 2024).
- Air India / Namaste.ai (Mar 2024) – Commissioned writer: “Spice Trip Around India”.
- Red FM Cork (Oct 2023) – Business in Focus on Green Saffron’s evolution.
- Newstalk Radio (Oct 2023) – Interview with Sean Moncrieff: music to masalas.
Live Events & Talks
- Ballymaloe Festival of Food (May 2024) – Speaker and demo chef
- Food & Drink Expo, NEC Birmingham (May 2024) – Represented Green Saffron on the international stage.
- Windesheim University, Netherlands (Dec 2023) – Guest inspiration speaker.
- Savour Kilkenny Festival (Oct 2023) – Live cooking demo.
SPICE INTEGRITY & PROVENANCE
At the heart of Arun’s work lies a simple belief: if you know where it comes from, you know how it should taste.
Green Saffron’s model is built on deep-rooted relationships with family farms across India, not just as suppliers, but as partners and core storytellers of the spice journey. This direct sourcing model isn't a trend. It's a 17-year commitment to traceability, seasonality, soil and story, a living, breathing spice route from farm to fork.
Arun and his team have pioneered a ‘Fresh Spice Gold Standard’, selecting only single-source, new-season crops with the highest volatile oil content. Every batch is traceable, Sedex-verified, and shipped within weeks of harvest. The result? Spices that arrive alive, not asleep.
In collaboration with Professor Chris Elliott and the Institute for Global Food Security at Queen’s University Belfast, Arun contributes to cutting-edge work tackling food fraud and improving spice transparency across Europe. Their shared goal: to prove the provenance of every grain, pod, and seed scientifically and sensorially.
This work places Arun at the intersection of culinary craft, agricultural ethics and academic rigour - shaping a future where spice isn’t just a kitchen essential, but a symbol of food integrity.
“We’re not just sourcing flavour. We’re rebuilding trust in one of the world’s oldest trades.” -Arun Kapil
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Arun's Books
Fresh Spice: Vibrant Recipes for Bringing Flavour, Depth and Colour to Home Cooking
Spice cookery has grown up. In a world of monochrome seasoning of white salt and black pepper, Fresh Spice breaks with tradition and fuses together spices and dishes from different cultures to create a unique cookbook. This book will change your perception of seasoning, flavours, textures and taste, as well as how you use spice. The science of cooking with spices is explored alongside the key rules for blending them together. The first rule is to divide them into categories of base, medium and high notes, with base being the earthy, strong spices such as turmeric, and high being more fragrant spices such as cardamom; the second is to divide them into colour groups, and to try to stay roughly within these when blending. But the real highlight of this book is its 120 extraordinary recipes, which use spices to transform classic dishes from all over the world. There's Poached chicken with lemongrass and herbs, Roast herbed salmon with cardamom sauce, Asafoetida risotto with walnuts and celery leaf, Winter leaves & spiced squash and Ginger & lime pudding. In the introduction Arun describes how to buy and cook with spices and takes a simple look at the science of flavour and the role of ayurvedic medicine in blending spices. In the comprehensive A-Z of Spices, he gives a description of the spices used in the book, along with their flavour and aroma profiles and how best to buy them.
Arun's Videos