Saffron

Saffron is the most expensive, finest, most aromatic, and renowned spice in the world, widely used in cooking, cosmetics, and healthcare. Most sources attribute its origin to Iran, which currently harvests over 99% of the world’s saffron. Iran is the largest exporter of saffron, while China is the largest importer.

The unique aroma, flavor, and vibrant yellow color of saffron come from compounds such as safranal (responsible for its fragrance) and crocin (responsible for its color). Advanced techniques like mass spectrometry and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) are used to detect counterfeit saffron.

Key Components of Saffron:

• Crocin: Provides the vibrant color.
• Picrocrocin: Responsible for the bitter taste.
• Safranal: Gives saffron its distinct aroma.
• Lycopene: A carotenoid also found in tomatoes.
• Beta-carotenes: Carotenoids also present in carrots.

Characteristics:

Saffron is a small, perennial plant, growing 10 to 30 cm tall. It has narrow, long leaves and produces one to three flowers per stem. The flowers have six purple petals (sometimes pink or lilac), three stamens, and a three-branched red-orange stigma. The stigma and style are the parts used as saffron, known for their fragrance and slightly bitter taste.

Pushal Saffron:

Pushal saffron is one of the categories of saffron. It is processed in such a way that a part of the saffron cream (about 1 to 3 mm) is left along with the stigma. This type of saffron, because it contains part of the stigma, reduces the possibility of fraud and attracts more people’s trust. Its coloring is more intense than that of bunch saffron, for this reason, most of the saffron purchased from farmers is of this type, but the quality of this type of saffron is lower than of Sargol saffron.

Appearance Features of Pushal Saffron:

• Three stigmatic branches are attached to each other.
• Its quality is between the bunch saffron and the All-Red (Sargol) saffron.
• There is a white section at the end and the red is not uniform.
• The color strength of the paper will be around 170 to 200 units, depending on its quality.
• There are two types of pushal saffron: regular and spiky.

Spiky Pushal Saffron:

If the saffron stigma is thick, smooth, and without curling, and the amount of cream with the stigma is small, the saffron is a spiky one.