The Journal.

A rack of forty jars usually produces the same three dishes. A tight palette forces decisions, and decisions are what give a blend character.

Our fifteen cover every direction a savoury formula needs: heat, smoke, sweetness, salt, acidity, herbs, earth and savoury depth.

Everyone starts from the same fifteen. Almost nobody ends up in the same place.

Sweet paprika is dried ripe pepper: fruity, mellow, mostly colour and body.

Smoked paprika is the same fruit dried over oak. It carries aroma that survives long cooking and dominates if you overpour.

Use sweet for volume, smoked for character. Most good rubs use both.

Dry pan, medium heat, single layer, constant movement. You are waiting for aroma, not colour.

Toast whole, cool completely, then grind. Grinding warm spice steams away the oils you just developed.

Toast each spice separately when the sizes differ — cumin and coriander do not finish at the same moment.

Rubs go flat because they have salt, heat and smoke but no acid.

Sumac delivers sour red fruit as a dry powder, so it can live inside a blend rather than being squeezed on at the end.

One to five percent is usually enough. Above that it turns astringent.

Salt does not add its own flavour so much as raise the volume of everything beside it.

Brown sugar caramelises on contact with heat, which is where a barbecue crust actually comes from.

Both are easy to overdo. Both are what separate a professional rub from a jar of dust.