Saffron is a spice made from the stigma of the flower of the saffron plant. The spice is used in cooking as a seasoning and medically.
Saffron is also used as a food coloring. It contains a dye, crocin, that gives food a rich golden color.
The cultivated saffron (saffron crocus C. sativus) flowers in the autumn and comes up every year, so it is known as a perennial plant.
Originating in West Asia, the saffron crocus certainly grew in Persia and was found in Southern Europe in antiquity, used medicinally and as a dye.
The Minoans had pictures of saffron in their palaces as long ago as 1500–1600 BC, showing how it could be used as a medicine.
The first document to mention saffron was a 7th century BC Assyrian book about botany, which was written in the time of Ashurbanipal.
Alexander the Great washed his hair in Persian saffron and Cleopatra used saffron in her baths.
After a feast many Romans would sleep on costly saffron-filled pillows in the belief that they would avoid a hangover.
The Moghuls used Saffron in food and took it with them from Persia to India.
Arabs grew the saffron plant in Spain by 960, but returning Crusaders brought the crocus corms to France, Germany and Italy in the 13th century.
During the Middle Ages saffron was so expensive some traders would try to increase their profits by bulking up the herb with yellow marigold petals. When authorities in Bavaria, where the spice was mainly traded, found out about these tainted parcels of saffron, the traders were burned alive.
Court ladies of Henry VIII's reign tinted their hair with saffron until the king forbade it. He feared a saffron shortage would result from the fashion statement, and that it might reach his own dining table.
In 1639 Amye Everard became the first Englishwoman to be granted a patent- for her "tincture of saffron and essence of roses."
Saffron is the most expensive spice in the world, having sold in recent years for as much as £2,700 per pound! The price tag is so high because it must be harvested by hand and it takes between 100,000 to 250,000 crocuses to make a pound of saffron.
Pound for pound, saffron is more expensive than gold.
Source Daily Telegraph
Saffron is also used as a food coloring. It contains a dye, crocin, that gives food a rich golden color.
The cultivated saffron (saffron crocus C. sativus) flowers in the autumn and comes up every year, so it is known as a perennial plant.
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| Saffron crocus by Serpico |
Originating in West Asia, the saffron crocus certainly grew in Persia and was found in Southern Europe in antiquity, used medicinally and as a dye.
The Minoans had pictures of saffron in their palaces as long ago as 1500–1600 BC, showing how it could be used as a medicine.
The first document to mention saffron was a 7th century BC Assyrian book about botany, which was written in the time of Ashurbanipal.
Alexander the Great washed his hair in Persian saffron and Cleopatra used saffron in her baths.
 |
| Persian saffron |
The Moghuls used Saffron in food and took it with them from Persia to India.
Arabs grew the saffron plant in Spain by 960, but returning Crusaders brought the crocus corms to France, Germany and Italy in the 13th century.
 |
| Saffron |
Court ladies of Henry VIII's reign tinted their hair with saffron until the king forbade it. He feared a saffron shortage would result from the fashion statement, and that it might reach his own dining table.
In 1639 Amye Everard became the first Englishwoman to be granted a patent- for her "tincture of saffron and essence of roses."
Saffron is the most expensive spice in the world, having sold in recent years for as much as £2,700 per pound! The price tag is so high because it must be harvested by hand and it takes between 100,000 to 250,000 crocuses to make a pound of saffron.
Pound for pound, saffron is more expensive than gold.
Source Daily Telegraph
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