Cooking With Star Anise: The Dos and Don'ts

Star anise is the dried, star-shaped fruit of Illicium verum, a tree thought to be native to southern China and northeastern Vietnam.¹ Its licorice taste comes from trans-anethole, which makes up 70 to 93 percent of the fruit’s essential oil.² That one compound is strong, and a single whole star can flavor a pot. This page covers where star anise is used, how much published recipes call for, whole versus ground, and the one safety issue every cook should know.

Where star anise does its best work

Chinese braises. Gernot Katzer’s Spice Pages calls star anise an indispensable spice for red braising, a technique it associates with Shanghai-style cooking.³ Kew notes that in China it is generally used in pork and chicken dishes.¹ The Woks of Life’s red braised pork belly uses 2 star anise.⁴

Five-spice powder. Star anise is one of the five spices in Chinese five-spice powder. The Woks of Life’s recipe counts 4 star anise as one part, alongside 2 parts fennel seed, 1 part cassia, 1 part Sichuan peppercorns and 1/3 part cloves.⁵ The same site says five-spice is at its best on meat, especially fatty meat.⁶

Chili oil. The Woks of Life’s Sichuan-style chili oil infuses 5 star anise in the oil.⁷

Vietnamese beef broth. Katzer says star anise is popular for beef soups in northern Vietnam.³ NPR’s one-day pho recipe adds whole star anise to the broth with cinnamon, cloves and peppercorns.⁸

South Asia. Katzer reports star anise in Kerala’s garam masala and as star-shaped fragments in local versions of the Mughal rice dish.³

Drinks. Kew lists star anise among the flavorings of Galliano, sambuca, pastis and some absinthes.¹ Katzer says Thai iced tea is black tea flavored with star anise powder.³ In the West, according to Katzer, star anise is mainly a cheaper stand-in for anise in mulled wine, desserts and liqueurs.³ Jennifer Segal’s mulled wine on Once Upon a Chef uses 2 whole star anise to a 750 ml bottle of red wine, with 2 cinnamon sticks and 6 whole cloves.⁹

Baking and processed foods. PROSEA lists baked goods, puddings, gelatins, beverages and meat products among the foods flavored with star anise fruit and oil.² Spiced cakes and poached fruit are a common home use, but we found no reference work that names specific Western desserts.

How much to use

No reference work gives a standard amount. The figures below are from named recipes (Attributed), so you can see the range.

Dish	Star anise	Source
Red braised pork belly	2 stars	The Woks of Life⁴
Mulled wine, one 750 ml bottle	2 stars	Once Upon a Chef⁹
Sichuan-style chili oil	5 stars	The Woks of Life⁷
Five-spice powder	4 stars = 1 part of about 5 1/3 parts	The Woks of Life⁵

Our starting point (Method): one or two whole stars for a pot of braise or broth that serves four to six, tasted toward the end. Katzer warns that five-spice is very aromatic and should be used with care;³ the same caution applies to the ground spice on its own.

Whole or ground

Whole stars go into liquids: braises, broths, syrups and mulled drinks. Fish them out before serving, or strain, as Segal’s mulled wine does.⁹ Whole stars stay hard after cooking, so removing them is common practice.

Ground star anise goes into spice blends, rubs and batters. McCormick gives 1 whole star as equal to 1/2 teaspoon ground (Attributed).¹⁰ For five-spice, Katzer advises keeping the spices whole and grinding them just before use,³ and The Woks of Life toasts the whole spices in a dry pan over low heat until fragrant before grinding.⁵

Not interchangeable with anise or fennel. All three get their licorice note from trans-anethole, but America’s Test Kitchen found that tasters could tell when one replaced another, and warns that swapping risks changing a recipe’s character.¹¹ See star anise vs. anise seed and star anise substitutes.

Timing

No source we found measures how fast star anise infuses. As cooking judgment: in a long braise, add whole stars at the start and taste after the first hour; if the licorice note is already where you want it, pull them out early rather than letting them run the full cook. Segal keeps mulled wine below a boil, warming it gently for 15 to 20 minutes.⁹

Storage

Form	Shelf guidance	Source
Whole spices (general)	2 years	America’s Test Kitchen¹²
Ground spices (general)	1 year	America’s Test Kitchen;¹² University of California Cooperative Extension¹³
Five-spice powder	Several months, cool, dark and dry	The Woks of Life⁶

None of these figures is specific to star anise. The UC extension names air, light, moisture and heat as what speeds flavor and color loss,¹³ so keep it sealed in a cool, dark cupboard. A fresh star should smell strongly of licorice when you snap off a point; that test is kitchen judgment, not a standard.

Safety: buy food-grade star anise

Japanese star anise (Illicium anisatum) is a toxic relative, and PROSEA warns that star anise is sometimes adulterated with similar-looking fruits, including that species.² In 2003 the FDA advised the public not to drink “teas” brewed from star anise after illnesses in about 40 people, including about 15 infants.¹⁴ FDA described Japanese star anise as long recognized as toxic in many countries.¹⁴ Buy star anise sold as a food spice from a reputable supplier, and never cook with stars sold for decoration or potpourri. More on the star anise profile.

Illicium verum Hook.f., Plants of the World Online and Kew Species Profiles, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. powo.science.kew.org · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³
Vu Ngoc Lô, Illicium verum, Plant Resources of South-East Asia (PROSEA). uses.plantnet-project.org · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³
Gernot Katzer, “Star Anise”, Gernot Katzer’s Spice Pages. gernot-katzers-spice-pages.com · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷
Judy Leung, “Chairman Mao’s Red Braised Pork Belly”, The Woks of Life, 2018. thewoksoflife.com · Publication ↩ ↩²
Kaitlin, “How to Make Five Spice Powder”, The Woks of Life, 2020. thewoksoflife.com · Publication ↩ ↩² ↩³
“Five Spice Powder”, The Woks of Life, 2020. thewoksoflife.com · Publication ↩ ↩²
Kaitlin, “How to Make Chili Oil”, The Woks of Life, 2020. thewoksoflife.com · Publication ↩ ↩²
T. Susan Chang, “One-Day Pho”, NPR, 2012. npr.org · Publication ↩
Jennifer Segal, “Mulled Wine”, Once Upon a Chef. onceuponachef.com · Publication ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴
“How to Grind Your Own Spices”, McCormick, 2025. mccormick.com · Merchant ↩
Andrew Janjigian, “Why Anise Seed, Fennel Seed, and Star Anise aren’t Interchangeable”, America’s Test Kitchen, 2020. americastestkitchen.com · Publication ↩
“Keeping Spices and Dried Herbs Fresher Longer”, America’s Test Kitchen. americastestkitchen.com · Publication ↩ ↩²
Anna Martin, “Add a Little Spice to Your Life! Part II”, University of California Cooperative Extension, 2002. ucanr.edu · Reference work ↩ ↩²
“Teas Made from Star Anise Were Associated With Illnesses Including Seizures”, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2003. fda.gov · Regulator ↩ ↩²

Cooking With Star Anise: Braises, Broths, Five-Spice and Mulled Wine