Cajun Seasoning Substitutes: Homemade, Creole and What to Do Without Either

Cajun seasoning is a ground blend sold as a shortcut to the flavors of south Louisiana cooking.¹ There is no fixed recipe. Most versions combine salt with red pepper, paprika, garlic and onion, and some add black pepper, thyme or celery seed.²³⁴⁵ Two of the three commercial labels below list salt first.²³⁴ A good substitute has to cover three things at once: salt, garlic and pepper flavor, and chile heat.

Quick answer

How the ratios on this page are labeled

Every ratio carries one of four labels.

• Computed: based on a measurable physical relationship, with the source named.
• Attributed: a named source publishes this ratio. We quote it as theirs.
• Disputed: named sources give different answers to the same swap. We show each one and do not average them.
• Method: we found no published ratio. We give a direction and a cautious starting point, and say so.

Computed figures here concern salt only, worked out from the sodium printed on Nutrition Facts labels. We found no credible published ratio for swapping any blend for Cajun seasoning, and no published heat measurement for Cajun blends.

What you are replacing

Salt varies twofold between the two labels that give a figure.²³ Check which kind your recipe was written for; a recipe built around a salt-first blend may not tell you to add salt separately.

The flavors come from familiar sources. Chile heat comes from capsaicinoids,⁶ paprika’s red color mainly from capsanthin and capsorubin,⁷ and thyme’s character from thymol and carvacrol, the characteristic constituents of its oil.⁸

If you want the closest overall match

1. Make your own

The ingredients are standard pantry spices, so a homemade blend comes closest.

Formula (Attributed): Cook’s Country’s Louisiana seasoning, offered for both Cajun and Creole cooking, uses 5 tablespoons paprika, 2 tablespoons garlic powder, and 1 tablespoon each of dried thyme, cayenne pepper, celery salt, salt and pepper. It makes about 3/4 cup and keeps for a few months.¹

Amount (Method): Cook’s Country gives no swap ratio. Its blend is led by paprika, not salt: by our arithmetic, plain salt is 1 of about 12 tablespoons, plus the tablespoon of celery salt.¹ Most salt-first store blends will be saltier spoon for spoon. Use the homemade blend 1:1 for flavor, then taste and add salt.

To change the heat, change the cayenne. The Louisiana tourism office’s guide makes the point that Cajun food is well seasoned rather than necessarily hot: cayenne “is seasoning, not the main event.”⁹

2. Creole seasoning

Cajun and Creole name different people and cooking styles. “Cajun” comes from les Acadiens, French colonists of the Acadia region of Canada;⁹ Britannica describes Cajuns as descendants of French Canadians the British drove out in the 18th century, who settled in the bayou country of southern Louisiana.¹⁰ The state tourism guide calls Creole cooking “city food” centered on New Orleans and Cajun cooking “country food.”⁹

On the spice shelf the line is thin. Cook’s Country tests the two as one category.¹ Tony Chachere’s Original Creole Seasoning lists salt, red pepper, black pepper, chili powder and garlic,¹¹ close to the Slap Ya Mama Cajun blend above.² The USDA’s purchasing specification does separate them: its Creole minimum adds black pepper, mustard and lemon peel to salt, paprika, garlic and cayenne.⁵ Tasting Table, citing MasterClass, says the two can be used interchangeably, with Cajun the spicier and Creole the more earthy.¹² PepperScale also names Creole seasoning as a Cajun substitute, since it has many of the same ingredients.¹³

Ratio (Computed, salt only): Tony Chachere’s lists 340 mg of sodium per quarter teaspoon.¹¹ Against Slap Ya Mama’s 310 mg, a 1:1 swap gives about 110 percent of the sodium, close enough to use as is. Against McCormick Signature’s 160 mg, 1:1 gives more than twice the sodium, so start with about half as much Tony Chachere’s and add paprika or garlic powder for bulk.³¹¹

For more heat (Attributed direction, Method amount): Tasting Table suggests adding red pepper flakes to Creole seasoning to make it taste more like Cajun.¹² It gives no amount. Start with a small pinch of cayenne or red pepper flakes per teaspoon of Creole seasoning, and taste.

If you have no Louisiana blend at all

Adobo seasoning, with cayenne

Goya’s adobo lists salt, garlic, black pepper, oregano and turmeric,¹⁴ and TASTE describes most adobo blends as garlic, pepper, salt and oregano.¹⁵ It shares the salt, garlic and black pepper of a Cajun blend like Slap Ya Mama,² but has no chile, so it brings no heat, and its oregano and turmeric are not on any of the Cajun labels above.²³⁴ The name comes from a marinade: the Real Academia Española defines adobo, among other senses, as a broth of vinegar, salt, oregano, garlic and pimentón used to season and preserve meat.¹⁶ The dry blend contains no vinegar.¹⁴

Ratio (Computed, salt only): Goya’s adobo carries 520 mg of sodium per quarter teaspoon,¹⁴ more than any Cajun label above. To match Slap Ya Mama’s salt, use about 3/5 as much adobo (310 ÷ 520); to match McCormick Signature, about 1/3 (160 ÷ 520).²³¹⁴

Heat (Method): Add cayenne to taste, starting with a small pinch per teaspoon of adobo. This is a starting point, not a measured equivalence.

Old Bay seasoning

PepperScale lists Old Bay as a useful Cajun seasoning substitute.¹³ By PepperScale’s reading of the label, Old Bay is celery salt (salt and celery seed), spices including red and black pepper, and paprika, in that order,¹⁷ so it shares a Cajun blend’s salt, red pepper and black pepper. Its celery is not on the Cajun labels above, and garlic, on all of them, is not named on Old Bay’s.²³⁴ PepperScale’s own comparison runs the other way: Cajun runs hotter and more garlic-forward than Old Bay.¹⁷

Ratio (Method): PepperScale gives no amount for this swap. Start with the recipe’s amount, taste, and add garlic powder and a pinch of cayenne to bring it closer.

Chili powder, with salt

The USDA’s purchasing specification says chili powder should include ground chili pepper, cumin, oregano, salt and garlic powder,⁵ and Saveur says the chile is usually ancho.¹⁸ So it shares the chile and garlic of Cajun seasoning but adds cumin and oregano, which push it toward chili con carne. It carries little salt: USDA FoodData Central’s reference sample works out to about 77 mg of sodium per teaspoon (2,870 mg per 100 g, at 2.7 g per teaspoon).¹⁹

Ratio (Method, with Computed salt): Start with chili powder 1:1 for the spice, and add salt separately. To match the sodium of a teaspoon of Slap Ya Mama (about 1,240 mg), add about 1/2 teaspoon of table salt; for McCormick Signature (about 640 mg), about 1/4 teaspoon.²³²⁰ Morton lists its table salt at 590 mg per quarter teaspoon.²⁰ The 1:1 spice amount is our starting point; chili powders vary in heat, so taste before adding cayenne.

What isn’t known

• No credible source we found publishes a ratio for replacing Cajun seasoning with any other blend. The salt figures are arithmetic from labels for the products named.
• No published heat measurement exists for any Cajun blend, so how much cayenne to add is a matter of taste.
• Brands do not publish the proportions of their spices beyond the order of ingredients.

Related

• Cajun seasoning and Cajun vs. Creole seasoning
• Creole seasoning and Creole seasoning substitutes
• Adobo seasoning and adobo seasoning substitutes
• Chili powder, paprika, cayenne pepper, thyme
• Old Bay vs. Creole seasoning, all-purpose seasoning substitutes