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What is the difference between spices and herbs?

Herbs are the fragrant leaves of plants that do not have woody stems, such as thyme, oregano, peppermint etc. Most often the plants are of the temperate climate zone.

Spices are the barks, berries, fruits, roots and stems of all kinds of plants. Most often these are of tropical origin, such as cloves, nutmeg and pepper. Curry is a mixture of spices.

Herbs are more fragrant when fresh, whereas spices often are stronger as dried powders.

The two terms are often used for both types however.

For more information, see http://www-ang.kfunigraz.ac.at/~katzer/engl/