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.

Negin Saffron:

The three stigmatic branches are attached to each other. There is no white part at the end. Negin saffron has high coloring power (about 240 to 260 units). The production and sale of Negin saffron is very low due to the time-consuming process of cleaning saffron in this method, the high cost, and the additional work required for processing.