Saffron, Spanish, Threads and Recipes.

Saffron is the most expensive spice on the planet and is used in many gourmet recipes. It fetches prices from $500 to $5000 per pound depending on its quality. This is because of the difficulty in harvesting saffron, which are actually the stigmas of the saffron crocus plant. Each plant only produces three small, red colored stigmas. Each weighs about .03g which means it would take 50,000 flowers to produce one pound (.49kg) of saffron. That is enough flowers to easily cover a football field. Saffron has to be harvested by hand which also drives up the price. Another difficult aspect to harvesting saffron is that all the plants flower within two weeks of the year and they only flower for less than a day. That means that thousands of workers have to work on constantly rotating shifts twenty four hours a day for two weeks.

Saffron’s bright red color is desirable for coloring foods, especially rice, one of the most common saffron dishes. It also has a unique flavor that is at the same time sweet like honey, hay-like, metallic and bitter. The complex flavors and ability to flavor other foods is part of its appeal. Don’t get it confused with safflower oil (or Portuguese saffron) which is a common substitute for saffron with a similar color, but distinctly different flavor. Saffron is often diluted with safflower oil because of its high price and mixed with sauce to make it go further.

Saffron crocus grows best in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf region. Spain and Iran are the largest producers of saffron in the world accounting for 80% of all production. Spanish saffron is characterized by a more mellow color and flavor than Iranian, or Persian saffron which is considered to be the most intense and flavorful. The best Iranian varieties are the most expensive. Iran is the largest producer of saffron in the world by far, even Spain’s harvest pales in comparison.

This rare plant has also been used to dye threads for clothing and saffron jewelry. It fades quickly from a vivid red or burgundy to a creamy yellow hue in sunlight, so having a red saffron colored cloth was considered rare and limited to nobility. One notable exception is its use as dye for Buddhist and Hindu monk’s robes. In Jainism, a sect of Buddhism, some of their statues are anointed with saffron in special religious ceremonies.

Saffron has also been used in many different fragrances and perfumes. Romans mixed it with wine and sprayed the resulting yellow spray in their theatres to freshen them and give them an alluring and distinct smell. Cleopatra put it in her bathes to make lovemaking more enjoyable. Alexander the Great is reported to have bathed in saffron to heal battle wounds which was mimicked by his soldiers and brought back to from his Persian wars. In Europe saffron was essential to the fragrance crocinum, an aromatic oil used to perfume hair.

Its use as medicine has fallen out of favor due to the difficulty in obtaining it, which makes it expensive to test. It is believed to slow aging and prevent or stop cancer, although these claims are not verified.

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