Saffron has long been considered to be the world’s most costly spice. Mentioned as far back as Biblical times, it has been grown from India through the mideast and all over Europe. Saffron is the stigma of a purple fall-flowering crocus. Each flower only has 3 stigmas and the flowers as well as the stigmas have to be hand plucked which is what results in the steep price that always accompanies it. Even today, spice merchants say that most of the crop is usually grown on small family farms who belong to cooperatives for the marketing and sale of their crop. Unlike most spices which begin to have distinct flavor loss after about a year, I’ve heard spice expert suggest that saffron can retain its distinctive flavor up to 5 years. Although if you’re keeping it that long you’re probably just not using it all!
I’ve always recommended that people buy whole saffron rather than ground saffron which is often available overseas and is usually quite a bit cheaper than whole saffron. The reason to avoid is the reason it’s a lot cheaper….it has typically been “cut” with other yellow-red spices such as turmeric.
Now it looks like there might be concern in regard to the whole saffron stigmas as well. According to a story in The Independent, a UK-based newspaper, a home cook who routinely used saffron began to notice a distinct decline in the flavor he was experiencing. Convinced that something was amiss he purchased large volumes for testing at the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Commerce. The results? According to their tests they say that in some cases only 10% of it was actually crocus stigmas and miscellaneous crocus parts could account for the remainder. It would appear that exporters are using other crocus parts that are dyed and then added to the actual stigmas. They say it isn’t a case of food safety but more of fraud. Yet another case of “Buyer Beware”.