All you Need to Know About Cardamom Grades

There are different classifications for Cardamom, which determine the size, color and liter weight of the pod. many US spice importers lean towards the biggest pods, which they say carry the most flavor and fragrance, although this is not entirely true, many customers think otherwise and prefer the smallest pods arguing the same case. 


When we talk about Green Cardamom, we can classify them in three Grades: 


Extra Fancy  or Super, (Extra) Bold: 


A very special variety. All capsules will be matured greenish and 
having above 8 mm diameter size. 
Lt. Wt. will be more than 450 gm

Fancy or Bold:


A Popular export grade; 90% and above capsules will be having 6.5mm and above diameter, matured and Greenish color.
Lt. Wt. will be 415 gms. 

Select or Small:

Cardamom having size between 5.5 mm and 6.5 mm. 

Cleaned and removed dust. husk and black capsules.

Lt. Wt. will be around 385 gms.

  


There's also the seeds, which we call:


Decorticated:

Black / Brown colour seeds are the original content in every Cardamom capsule.
The husks were fully removed.
Lt. Wt may be around 550 gm to 600 gm.

Indian cardamom is offered to the international markets in five different grades: 


Alleppey Green Extra Bold' (AGEB)
Size 7mm above wt/lt 435 gms. 

Alleppey Green Bold' (AGB) 
Size 6mm above wt/lt 415gms 


Alleppey Green Superior' (AGS)
Size 5mm above wt/lt 385 gms 


AGS‐1 Alleppey Green Shipment Green‐1
Size 4mm above wt/lt 350gms 


AGS‐2 Alleppey Green Shipment Green‐2
Size 4mm above wt/lt 320gms 

Special characteristics
Grade designation	Trade Name	Colour	Empty and malformed capsules percentage by count (max.)	Immature and shrivelled capsules percentage by weight (max.)	Blacks and splits percent by count (max.)	Size (diameter of the hole in mm) of the sieve on which retained***	Weight in G/L (min.)
AGEB	Cardamom Extra Bold	Deep Green, or Light green	2.0	2.0	0.0	7.0	435
AGB	Cardamom Bold	-Do-	2.0	2.0	0.0	6.0	415
AGS	Cardamom Superior	-Do-	3.0	5.0	0.0	5.0	385

GUATEMALAN Cardamom producers often classify them by CODES, Extra Fancy G1, Fancy G2, Select G3,G4. according to the table below.

While traders in SRI LANKA use various designations fro Green Cardamoms:

• Kandy Type – Relatively large, dark greenish colour.

• Copernicus type - Slightly smaller than the Kandy, colour generally green. 

• General faq. type - Small Cardamoms with grey-green colour.

As you can see, there is not a universal system to grade cardamom, the best that we can do as cardamom producers, importers, consumers, is familiarize ourselves with the various types of varieties available and learn to recognize its individual qualities to get a broader knowledge of this particular spice.