Lead in Cinnamon and Ground Spices: What the FDA Found, and What It Means for Your Spice Rack

Last updated: September 21, 2026

We may earn a commission when you buy through links on this page, at no extra cost to you. How we research and rate.

The short version

In 2023 the FDA traced hundreds of children’s elevated blood lead levels to cinnamon, and the investigation that followed is still open. Testing of the cinnamon used in recalled applesauce pouches returned lead at up to 5,110 parts per million. For scale, the international standard-setting body Codex Alimentarius is considering a maximum of 2.5 ppm for lead in bark spices. The contaminated cinnamon was roughly two thousand times that figure.

The separate ground cinnamon alert that followed is not a closed historical event either. It began in March 2024 with six distributors and has been added to repeatedly since, most recently in December 2025. One product added in October 2025 tested at 10.7 ppm.

What this does not mean is that cinnamon is dangerous. It means a specific, identifiable set of products was contaminated, that the FDA believes the contamination was deliberate and commercial in motive, and that the way you buy ground spices decides how exposed you are to a repeat.

The scale of it

What actually happened with the applesauce pouches

The investigation started from the other end — from sick children rather than from a product test. In October 2023 the FDA began looking into reports of children with elevated blood lead levels, and the trail led to cinnamon apple puree pouches. On 28 October 2023 the agency discussed its analytical findings with WanaBana LLC and issued a safety alert. The recall expanded on 9 November 2023 to cover Schnucks and Weis brand cinnamon applesauce as well.

The FDA then tested cinnamon at the Austrofoods facility in Ecuador that supplied the pouches. That is where the 5,110 ppm figure comes from. The same samples contained chromium at 1,201 and 531 ppm.

The case numbers are the part that tends to get lost. By 22 March 2024, the CDC had received reports of 136 confirmed cases, 345 probable cases and 38 suspected cases — 519 in total, across 44 states plus Washington DC and Puerto Rico. These were overwhelmingly young children, because a fruit pouch is a toddler’s food and because a small body takes up a far higher proportion of ingested lead than an adult’s.

The category itself is not the problem — we cover organic applesauce and organic baby food pouches in their own guides, where the question is which makers publish testing. Three brands of pouch were recalled: WanaBana apple cinnamon fruit puree, Schnucks-brand cinnamon-flavored applesauce pouches and variety packs, and Weis-brand cinnamon applesauce pouches.

Why the FDA thinks this was deliberate

The agency has been unusually direct about the likely cause. In its post-incident summary the FDA states that “the FDA’s leading hypothesis is that this contamination event was the result of economically motivated adulteration of the cinnamon used in the applesauce.”

Economically motivated adulteration means adding something to a food to make money — to increase weight, improve color, or pass a quality test the genuine product would fail. The chromium result is what points that way here. Lead chromate is a heavy, intensely orange-red pigment, and a spice sold by weight with color as a quality signal is a product where both of those properties are worth money to a dishonest supplier.

The FDA’s follow-up actions read accordingly. In June 2024 it placed Negasmart, the foreign cinnamon distributor in the chain, on Import Alert 99-47, which covers products appearing adulterated for economic gain, and Import Alert 99-42 for heavy metal contamination. It issued warning letters to manufacturers, importers and retailers between June and December 2024, and its staff took part in Codex meetings in spring 2024 working towards recommended international maximum lead levels for bark spices.

The ground cinnamon alert, and why it is still open

After the pouches, the FDA ran a targeted survey of ground cinnamon sold at discount retail stores. On 6 March 2024 it advised consumers to throw away and not to buy products from six distributors, with results ranging from 2.03 to 3.40 ppm:

The alert has kept growing. In October 2025 the FDA added DEVI-brand ground cinnamon at 2.92 ppm and a BaiLiFeng-brand product at 10.7 ppm — the highest figure in the ground cinnamon series so far. Venzu Traders dalchini powder at 3.00 ppm followed in November 2025, and Lucky Foods cinnamon powder at 3.00 and 4.17 ppm in December 2025.

The agency’s advice on these products is to stop using them and dispose of them, not to eat, sell or serve them, and to check your home carefully — because, as the FDA points out, ground spices have a long shelf life. A jar bought two years ago is very likely still in the cupboard. Its guidance also notes that most people have no obvious immediate symptoms from this kind of exposure, which is exactly why it is worth checking a list rather than waiting to feel something.

What limits actually exist for lead in spices

This is the uncomfortable part. There is no federal maximum level for lead in ground spices sold in the United States. The numbers above are not breaches of a limit, because for this category no limit exists to breach. The FDA acted on them through public health alerts, import alerts and warning letters rather than by citing a threshold.

What exists instead:

• Codex Alimentarius is considering 2.5 ppm as a maximum level for lead in bark spices, which includes cinnamon. FDA staff took part in that work in 2024. It is a proposal in progress, not an enforceable US rule.
• Baby food has its own action levels. The FDA finalized 10 parts per billion for lead in most processed baby foods in January 2025, and 20 ppb for single-ingredient root vegetables. Note the unit change: 10 ppb is 0.01 ppm. The cinnamon results above are in a different order of magnitude entirely.
• California’s Proposition 65 applies to products sold in that state, and spices are among the categories where warnings appear. A warning means a possible exposure above California’s safe harbor level; it does not tell you how much.

The practical consequence is that a spice jar carries no number and is required to carry none. Nothing on the label distinguishes a supplier that tests every lot from one that tests nothing. That asymmetry is the whole problem, and it is the same one we describe in our explainer on heavy metals in organic food.

What food safety law already requires of the companies selling this

It would be easy to read the absence of a lead limit for spices as an absence of rules. That is not quite right, and the difference matters when you are deciding which supplier to trust.

Food facilities in the United States operate under preventive controls rules that require a written hazard analysis. Under 21 CFR 117.130, that analysis must identify known or reasonably foreseeable hazards, and the regulation is explicit that chemical hazards are included — “substances such as pesticide and drug residues, natural toxins, decomposition, unapproved food or color additives, and food allergens.”

More pointedly, the same section requires a facility to consider hazards that “may be intentionally introduced for purposes of economic gain.” That phrase describes the cinnamon case exactly. The scenario the FDA believes occurred is one that US food law already obliges a facility to think about in advance, document, and control.

So the honest description of the gap is not that nobody is required to care. It is that the requirement lands on the company, is verified by inspection rather than before sale, and produces no number that reaches you. A firm meeting that obligation properly is running supplier controls and testing incoming spice lots. A firm meeting it on paper is writing a plan and filing it. From the outside, at the point of purchase, those two look identical — unless the company chooses to publish.

That is why the question worth asking a spice brand is not “is your cinnamon safe”, which every company will answer yes to. It is “do you test incoming lots for heavy metals, and will you show me a result for this one?” One is a sentiment; the other is a document that either exists or does not.

How lead gets into ground spice in the first place

Three routes, and they call for different responses, which is why lumping them together produces confused advice.

From the soil, in small amounts. Every plant takes up trace elements from the ground it grows in, and spices are no exception. This is the background level present in more or less all agricultural produce, it is usually measured in parts per billion, and it is not what the FDA findings are about. It is the same background question we look at in organic rice and organic cocoa powder, where the metal comes from the field rather than the factory. Nothing you do at the shop changes it much; variety in your diet is the response, as it is for rice, cocoa and leafy greens.

From processing and handling. Drying spice on open ground near traffic, grinding with worn equipment, or storing in containers with leaded solder can all add contamination that was not in the plant. This is a supply chain quality problem, and it is the one that a serious buyer’s supplier controls are designed to catch.

From deliberate addition. This is the category the 2023 cinnamon case falls into, and it is different in kind rather than degree. The levels are not slightly elevated; the 5,110 ppm result is thousands of times the background range, which is precisely what led the FDA to a hypothesis of economically motivated adulteration rather than contamination. No amount of washing, grinding at home or choosing a different species protects against this. Only knowing your supplier does.

The practical implication of the three routes is that the popular advice — buy Ceylon, buy organic, buy whole — addresses the first two reasonably well and the third only indirectly. Buying whole helps because a whole stick is harder to adulterate, not because the plant is cleaner. That is a subtle distinction and it is the one that decides whether your precautions actually match the risk.

What this means for your spice rack

None of this is a reason to stop using cinnamon, and it is emphatically not a reason to panic about a sprinkle on porridge. It is a reason to change how you buy, in five specific ways.

1. Check the FDA’s list against what you own. The ground cinnamon alert names brands and distributors, it is updated as new results come in, and the products have long shelf lives. This takes two minutes and is the only step that addresses a jar already in your kitchen.

2. Be wary of unbranded and deep-discount ground spices. The FDA’s survey specifically targeted ground cinnamon sold at discount retail stores, and that is where it found the problem. A spice priced far below everything around it has to have saved money somewhere in a chain that runs through several countries.

3. Buy whole and grind where you can. Adulteration of the kind the FDA suspects works on powder, because powder can be bulked and colored without anyone noticing. Cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, whole nutmeg and peppercorns are all visibly what they are. The same reasoning applies to everything sold as a powder: cayenne, seasoning blends and even vanilla, where the form you buy decides how much you have to trust the supplier. A cheap grinder or microplane handles them, and the flavour is better.

4. Prefer suppliers who publish testing. A handful of spice companies now publish heavy metal results by lot. That is a genuine differentiator in a category with no required disclosure, and it is the single thing most worth paying extra for. The standard to apply is the one we use for supplements: a document naming the method, the limit and the actual result, tied to a batch. Our explainer on third-party testing covers how to read one.

5. Vary what you use. Rotating brands and spices spreads the risk of any single contaminated source, which is the same logic that applies to rice, cocoa and juice. It is unglamorous advice and it is the most reliable protection available to a shopper who cannot test anything.

If you think you have used a recalled product

The FDA’s own guidance on these products is worth repeating exactly, because the reassuring part and the concerning part sit together. Most people have no obvious immediate symptoms from this kind of exposure. That is not a reason to relax; it is the reason the agency asks people to check the product list rather than wait to feel unwell.

If a jar in your kitchen matches the alert, stop using it and dispose of it rather than finishing it, and do not pass it on. If it has been used regularly, particularly by a child, the FDA’s advice is to contact a healthcare provider, who can arrange a blood lead test. That test is the only way to answer the question for a specific person; a spice jar cannot tell you what was absorbed.

Two points of proportion, both true at once. A single exposure from a sprinkle of cinnamon is a very different matter from a toddler eating contaminated fruit pouches daily for months, which is what produced the 2023 case numbers. And there is no level of lead exposure that is affirmatively good for a child, which is why the response to a match on the list is to remove it rather than to calculate a dose.

Storing spices so the question comes up less often

A practical footnote, since the FDA’s warning turns on shelf life. Ground spices keep for years in the sense that they remain safe and edible, and they lose their aromatic compounds within months. That gap is why old jars accumulate: nothing about them announces that they should go.

• Date the jar when you open it. A marker line on the lid takes two seconds and tells you next year whether this is the jar that was in the cupboard during a recall window.
• Buy smaller quantities more often. The bulk jar is cheaper per ounce and worse on both counts here: weaker flavor by the end, and longer exposure to any single supplier’s batch.
• Keep spices away from heat and light, which means not above the stove, however convenient that rack is. Heat drives off the volatile oils that are the reason you bought the spice.
• Grind what you can, when you need it. Whole cinnamon sticks, cloves, nutmeg and peppercorns keep their aroma far longer than pre-ground, and a whole spice is a harder thing to adulterate unseen.

Ceylon or cassia: what that choice does and does not settle

Almost every article about cinnamon safety pivots here, so it is worth being precise about what the distinction covers.

Two different plants are sold as cinnamon. Ceylon cinnamon is Cinnamomum verum, mostly from Sri Lanka: pale, brittle, with thin layers that crumble, and a mild flavour. Cassia is one of several related species, notably Cinnamomum cassia, and it is what most supermarket cinnamon is: darker, harder, a single thick curl, and considerably more pungent. Cassia dominates the US market and is the cheaper of the two.

The usual reason given for choosing Ceylon is coumarin, a naturally occurring compound found at much higher levels in cassia than in Ceylon. European food safety authorities have set guidance on tolerable coumarin intake, and heavy daily cassia use is where that becomes a consideration — not an occasional teaspoon.

But coumarin and lead are unrelated questions, and this is the point most coverage misses. Coumarin is naturally present in the plant. Lead in the FDA’s findings was not: the agency’s hypothesis is that it was added somewhere in the supply chain. Choosing Ceylon lowers your coumarin intake. It does nothing in itself to protect you from an adulterated batch, because adulteration is about who handled the product, not which tree it came from.

If you want both, the answer is Ceylon cinnamon from a supplier that publishes batch testing. Our Ceylon cinnamon guide reads what the listings actually state, and our cloves, ground ginger and turmeric guides apply the same test to the other spices where this question comes up.

Where organic certification fits

It does not solve this, and it is important to be straight about that on a site called Organic Connection.

USDA organic certification governs how a crop is grown and handled: no synthetic pesticides, no prohibited substances, an audited chain of custody. It includes no requirement to test the finished spice for lead, arsenic or cadmium. A certified organic cinnamon can be contaminated, and an uncertified one can be clean.

What organic certification does contribute is a documented supply chain with an annual inspection, which makes an anonymous adulterated batch harder to insert unnoticed. That is a real if partial benefit, and it is worth having alongside published testing rather than instead of it. Where organic earns its premium unambiguously is pesticide residue, which is a different question from metals entirely.

Common questions about lead in cinnamon and spices

Is it safe to eat cinnamon?

For most people, yes. The FDA’s findings concern specific named products, not cinnamon as a category. The sensible response is to check the alert list against what is in your cupboard, avoid unbranded deep-discount ground spices, and buy from suppliers who publish testing where you can.

How much lead was found in the cinnamon applesauce?

The FDA’s testing of cinnamon at the supplying facility in Ecuador returned a highest result of 5,110 ppm lead. The same samples contained chromium at 1,201 and 531 ppm. Codex is considering a maximum of 2.5 ppm for lead in bark spices, so the contaminated material was around two thousand times that proposed level.

Which ground cinnamon brands were recalled?

The March 2024 FDA public health alert named La Fiesta, Marcum, MK (MTCI), Swad, Supreme Tradition and El Chilar, with results between 2.03 and 3.40 ppm. Products added later include DEVI (2.92 ppm), BaiLiFeng (10.7 ppm), Venzu Traders dalchini powder (3.00 ppm) and Lucky Foods (3.00 and 4.17 ppm). The list is maintained by the FDA and has been updated as recently as December 2025.

Is there a legal limit for lead in spices?

Not in the United States. No federal maximum level exists for lead in ground spices, which is why the FDA acted through public health alerts, import alerts and warning letters rather than by citing a threshold. Codex Alimentarius is considering a 2.5 ppm maximum for bark spices.

Was the contamination accidental?

The FDA states that its leading hypothesis is economically motivated adulteration — in other words, something was added deliberately for commercial gain. The presence of chromium alongside lead is consistent with lead chromate, a dense orange-red pigment that would add both weight and color to ground spice.

Does Ceylon cinnamon contain less lead than cassia?

Not inherently. The Ceylon versus cassia distinction is about species and, in particular, coumarin content, which is naturally higher in cassia. Lead contamination of the kind the FDA found comes from the supply chain rather than the plant, so it can affect either type.

Does organic cinnamon avoid this problem?

No. Organic certification covers growing and handling practices and does not require testing the finished spice for heavy metals. It does bring an audited supply chain, which helps, but published batch testing is what actually answers the question.

Should I throw away my cinnamon?

Only if it appears on the FDA’s list, or if it is an unbranded or unlabeled ground spice of unknown origin. Ground spices keep for years, so an old jar bought during the affected period is worth checking rather than assuming.

Are other spices affected?

Lead has been found in other ground spices historically, and the same economic incentives apply wherever a powder is sold by weight and judged by color. Turmeric is the other spice where this incentive is strongest, for the same reason: it is sold ground, bought by weight, and judged largely on how vivid it looks. Buying whole where practical is the habit that generalizes.

Who is most at risk?

Young children, by a wide margin. The 2023 cases were identified in children because a fruit pouch is a child’s food, and because a small body absorbs a far greater share of ingested lead than an adult’s. The FDA’s own framing is that there is no known safe level of exposure to lead.

How do I check whether a brand tests its spices?

Ask for a certificate of analysis for the lot number on your jar. A useful one names the testing method, the limit it was measured against and the actual result, and comes from an accredited laboratory. Anything that only says “tested for purity” is a marketing sentence, not a result.

Sources

• FDA: Investigation of Elevated Lead & Chromium Levels, Cinnamon Applesauce Pouches (November 2023)
• FDA: Post-Incident Response Activities, Cinnamon Applesauce Pouches
• FDA: Alert Concerning Certain Cinnamon Products Due to Presence of Elevated Levels of Lead
• FDA: More Ground Cinnamon Products Added to Public Health Alert
• FDA: Action Levels for Lead in Processed Food Intended for Babies and Young Children

Related reading

• Organic Food and Pantry hub
• Heavy metals in organic food, explained
• Best Organic Ceylon Cinnamon
• Third-party testing, and how to read a certificate of analysis
• Organic Product Database — compare brands across every guide

Organic Connection is reader supported. We read every product listing in full, check the claims in it, and say plainly when a claim cannot be verified. How we research and rate.