06-07-2025
- General
- South China Morning Post
The many uses of saffron, the world's most expensive spice: featuring mostly in Persian and Indian cuisine, where it's favoured for its bright yellow colour and complex taste, it takes hours to proces
Chef-owner Bardia Ilbeiggi of the modern Persian restaurant Delara in Vancouver, Canada, says there's an Iranian myth that saffron makes people happy.
'I don't know how scientific it is, but there's an old Iranian folk story that the more saffron you use, the happier you get,' he says.
Saffron threads on stoneware with an antique spoon.
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'It's also a sign of generosity, because saffron is expensive and it's very hard to harvest it, hence the price. But when you go to someone's home and they serve you rice topped up with a lot of saffron, that shows they care for their guests, so I try to do the same thing at my restaurant.'
For Ilbeiggi, saffron evokes childhood memories, because when cooking this golden-coloured natural spice, the whole house fills with a warm, musky scent that has a hint of honey.
Cultivated for over 3,500 years, saffron is a spice from the dried stigma of Crocus sativus. It is grown mostly in Iran, as well as India, Spain, France and Italy. It is pricey because each crocus flower only grows three red stigmas that are carefully handpicked. In addition, the annual flowering season is short, and in some places the crocuses must be harvested before dawn as the sun's heat can degrade the delicate plant.
Harvesters in Spain pick the three red-orange stigma from each saffron crocus blossom to be sold as the saffron spice. It takes approximately 70,000 blossoms to produce a pound of spice.
The stigmas are then dried immediately over low heat or in dehydrators to preserve their quality, flavour and aroma. For one kilogram of saffron, around 150,000 to 200,000 crocuses need to be harvested. This process can take up to 400 hours, making saffron the most expensive spice in the world.
Luckily only a small pinch, around 20 threads, of these reddish-yellow stigmas are needed to flavour food – too much can be overpowering and lead to a bitter taste.
The aromatic spice that adds a brilliant yellow colour to dishes can be found in not only Persian cuisine, but also in Spanish dishes – in the shallow pans of fragrant paella with seafood such as clams, shrimp, mussels, calamari and seafood stews.
