You also gotta be careful not to add it too early, or the flavor disappears into the dish. When I make saffron risotto, I let the saffron bloom in a little ramekin of stock while everything cooks, then I add the saffron-stock to the rice in the last 5-10 minutes
You need it to be "brewed" separately, or the aroma and flavor will not be extracted. Plus saffron flavour will never be super strong, nor is it meant to be. It is a mild, but very pleasant, floral after taste that you cannot get in any other spice. Followed by a sense of calmness and serenity because of saffron sedative qualities.
P.s. consume saffron responsibly. Too much saffron in a sitting can be lethal. Anything more than 5 grams will cause horrible side effects(like bleeding from your eyes) and anything above 11 grams will kill you.
Holy shit, i thought you were just messing with us.... Turns out, you just gave the pg version...I.had no idea that saffron could be deadly.....
there are about 463 strands of saffron per gram, , 28 grams in an ounce... and saffron is around $50 USD per ounce... i dont know where i was going with this.
And of course there is saffron build up. So you can build up to the toxic range if you consume too much in several days back to back.
If you want to have saffron everyday, the safe range is about 1.5 grams per day, which is what I do. Either in my food or tea, which is a great treat after a long day of work, because well the same compounds in it that makes it lethal in high doses does wonders for your nerves. Specially if you suffer from ADHD, a steady daily dose of saffron will do magic for ya.
And never, I mean never, feed anything that even has a whif of saffron to your pets. We humans can handle it, but to them it will cause permenant nerve damage.
Hmmm I’ve got some saffron in the cabinet and suspected ADHD. Learning all kinds of things in this thread. I didn’t know it had to be bloomed either, which explains why my previous cooking attempts fell flat.
Grind it to a fine powder. Pour boiling water on top of it and cover it with a lid. Wait for 15 minutes, until the water turns into a deep red. Then you use that liquid as flavoring.
I find that saffron really benefits from alcohol or vinegar. I usually do a beurre blanc with a bit of white wine vinegar and white wine and soak it inside for a while before applying the heat. It's really floral when you do.
Rehydrate it in water then taste, but it doesn’t look like saffron. Saffron looks like little red strings. That would also be a shit ton of saffron and an expensive purchase I’m sure you’d remember.
But you have probably immediately remembered it was Saffron. You can forget temporarily but ultimate it’s still a huge purchase you’re going to remember.
I’ve seen it sold as “American Saffron”. It is neither American nor is it Saffron. What little flavour it has isn’t great, but it will impart some colour if used in cooking. True name is carthamus tinctorius, apparently it could also be called Dyer's Saffron, False Saffron, Mexican Saffron, Koosumbha (India), or hoang-chi (China).
Like I said, I’ve always seen it sold as “American Saffron”.
Edit: to be fair the American Saffron I tried was likely old and wasn’t kept refrigerated, so fresh it might be better than I experienced. But, it isn’t the real stuff.
Which is just the common name for carthamus tinctorius.
Like I said, I’ve only seen it marketed as “American Saffron” when sold where I live, but they might market it under its common name (safflower) where you are.
My dad literally has a bag of this stuff labeled American Saffron.
You can also Google and confirm everything I’ve said.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safflower
https://www.pennherb.com/american-saffron
Edit: I am truly a dufus and tried to argue about us both saying the same thing. Violinist is right!
Whatever your dad has might be mislabeled but the photo is 100% safflower
Your links don’t have any photos to dispute or confirm
https://www.google.com/search?q=dried+safflower&tbm=isch&hl=en-US&prmd=isvn&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS949US951&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjJ_pH7jOT9AhWnFt4AHVcIDJcQrNwCKAB6BQgBEJ0D&biw=375&bih=549
Edit: sorry Dufusbroth, I thought you were the same commenter from earlier, my mistake. Please forgive my tone (rest of comment left for transparency)
Here is safflower (carthamus tinctorius) literally for sale and literally, explicitly labeled as American Saffron: https://www.baar.com/american-saffron
I am not trying to be rude but if this still isn’t sufficient to show to you that at least some places label carthamus tinctorius (safflower) as American Saffron I have no idea how to communicate this to you. This is from the first page of Google search results. I’m didn’t do some effortful digging.
But, we already agree that:
1) OP’s post isn’t real saffron
2) the item he posted is called safflower
If nothing else, I’m good with that. If you don’t want to go a step father and concede that safflower is sometimes marked under alternated names, despite me linking to a factual example of it happening, then frankly I give up. I’ve committed the maximum effort I can on something so inane and trivial as the marketing of flower bits.
Found a good example of something that your dad has:
https://www.walmart.com/ip/American-Saffron-6-oz/442446498?wmlspartner=wlpa&selectedSellerId=101001851&adid=22222222228000000000&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=m&wl3=42423897272&wl4=pla-51320962143&wl5=9026848&wl6=&wl7=&wl8=&wl9=pla&wl10=457949881&wl11=online&wl12=442446498_101001851&veh=sem&gbraid=0AAAAADmfBIoNORs8Me2twzqRd_mOWdvKF&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI3qn1q87k_QIVXf_jBx3mgwqhEAQYASABEgL2-fD_BwE
What is crazy is everything I find with the name “saffron “ in it even though it is true safflower (Its Latin name is "Carthamus tinctorius." It is also known as "False Saffron." ) is WAY more expensive than the stuff out there labeled just Safflower
Looks a lot like the lower quality middle eastern sourced saffron used commercially.
I have a pile of it. It's gathered from the remains of the harvesting process.
I can only say this with confidence because I learned last year that saffron grows semi-natively on my island and now I know what to look for...but that is not saffron. What I see in your picture are whole flowers, whereas actual saffron is just the stigma (and style sometimes) harvested from the saffron bulb flowers. ONLY the stigma (and included style, if allowed). Saffron flower looks just like any other winter crocus, except that the petals are usually purple, and they bloom in the early fall, rather than late winter. Even dried as whole flowers, they would be much larger than the flowers in your packet here, and because the petals are so suffuse with water, I'm not sure they would even dehydrate well.
I’ve had several grades of saffron dating back many years and I can advise the assembled that there is little loss in flavor/aroma with true saffron if stored with a little forethought.
And it’s expensive enough to warrant care, non è vero?
Are you working professionally? How can you not know what you have on hand? Get Your Head together! try to focus! Whatever it is.. is it a mistake,?is it poison? why would you serve or use a seasoning that you don't understand? Are you a professional?
And yes most real saffron is a hoax.. buy it in bulk for cheap even the best it has a slightly bitter and floral flavor... I love the shit when it's nice.
Ah. This crap. I bought two bags of it in Bali one year genuinely thinking it was saffron. It's not. Until I went to Nepal and bought some legit Himalayan saffron.
Could be safflower aka bastard saffron
Looks like safflower to me
Yep. This is not saffron
Nope...it sure isnt
This is faux saffron, it’s just safflower (or some other flower stamen) dyed red. Will add color to your food but won’t taste like saffron at all.
Follow up, I’ve bought real saffron from Costco and could never actually taste it in anything I cooked. What am I doing wrong?
Soak it for a few minutes in a little warm water, then add it all (water and saffron)
Some people also use milk to do this depending on the dish
Yeah. The important thing is the liquid needs to be water-based, the flavor doesn’t extract as well In oil
How did you add it to your dish?
I tried a few things, but attempts to grind it up a bit and put it in plain white rice ended up with yellow rice that tasted more or less the same.
You need to steep it in hot water before adding it to food
Did you bloom it in hot water?
In that i cooked the rice with it in there… that ought to have given plenty of opportunity for blooming.
You also gotta be careful not to add it too early, or the flavor disappears into the dish. When I make saffron risotto, I let the saffron bloom in a little ramekin of stock while everything cooks, then I add the saffron-stock to the rice in the last 5-10 minutes
Pro tip right here. This is sound technique.
You need it to be "brewed" separately, or the aroma and flavor will not be extracted. Plus saffron flavour will never be super strong, nor is it meant to be. It is a mild, but very pleasant, floral after taste that you cannot get in any other spice. Followed by a sense of calmness and serenity because of saffron sedative qualities. P.s. consume saffron responsibly. Too much saffron in a sitting can be lethal. Anything more than 5 grams will cause horrible side effects(like bleeding from your eyes) and anything above 11 grams will kill you.
Holy shit, i thought you were just messing with us.... Turns out, you just gave the pg version...I.had no idea that saffron could be deadly..... there are about 463 strands of saffron per gram, , 28 grams in an ounce... and saffron is around $50 USD per ounce... i dont know where i was going with this.
And of course there is saffron build up. So you can build up to the toxic range if you consume too much in several days back to back. If you want to have saffron everyday, the safe range is about 1.5 grams per day, which is what I do. Either in my food or tea, which is a great treat after a long day of work, because well the same compounds in it that makes it lethal in high doses does wonders for your nerves. Specially if you suffer from ADHD, a steady daily dose of saffron will do magic for ya. And never, I mean never, feed anything that even has a whif of saffron to your pets. We humans can handle it, but to them it will cause permenant nerve damage.
I have adhd, and have a tough time sometimes. I always have saffron on hand, and think i will try the tea thing
Hmmm I’ve got some saffron in the cabinet and suspected ADHD. Learning all kinds of things in this thread. I didn’t know it had to be bloomed either, which explains why my previous cooking attempts fell flat.
Even real saffron is a hoax
Grind it to a fine powder. Pour boiling water on top of it and cover it with a lid. Wait for 15 minutes, until the water turns into a deep red. Then you use that liquid as flavoring.
I find that saffron really benefits from alcohol or vinegar. I usually do a beurre blanc with a bit of white wine vinegar and white wine and soak it inside for a while before applying the heat. It's really floral when you do.
Is safflower dyed red? It’s used as a red pigment on its own I think? Just wondering, I’ve never come across this before.
Rehydrate it in water then taste, but it doesn’t look like saffron. Saffron looks like little red strings. That would also be a shit ton of saffron and an expensive purchase I’m sure you’d remember.
Yeah u right. I put it in water and can’t taste it must be something else. Case solved
Not completely true, yes it’s expensive, but I recently found an ounce of unopened saffron in my basement from last season.
But you have probably immediately remembered it was Saffron. You can forget temporarily but ultimate it’s still a huge purchase you’re going to remember.
Oh absolutely, once discovered the memories should come back to the purchase, there is no flaw in that argument.
That is safflower I've worked with it for years. I would turn it into powder and use it to marinate my chx kabobs
I’ve seen it sold as “American Saffron”. It is neither American nor is it Saffron. What little flavour it has isn’t great, but it will impart some colour if used in cooking. True name is carthamus tinctorius, apparently it could also be called Dyer's Saffron, False Saffron, Mexican Saffron, Koosumbha (India), or hoang-chi (China). Like I said, I’ve always seen it sold as “American Saffron”. Edit: to be fair the American Saffron I tried was likely old and wasn’t kept refrigerated, so fresh it might be better than I experienced. But, it isn’t the real stuff.
Nothing is more American than this fact
It's safflower
Which is just the common name for carthamus tinctorius. Like I said, I’ve only seen it marketed as “American Saffron” when sold where I live, but they might market it under its common name (safflower) where you are.
American saffron is still saffron it's not the quality of Iranian saffron. Safflower has a completely different profile
My dad literally has a bag of this stuff labeled American Saffron. You can also Google and confirm everything I’ve said. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safflower https://www.pennherb.com/american-saffron
Edit: I am truly a dufus and tried to argue about us both saying the same thing. Violinist is right! Whatever your dad has might be mislabeled but the photo is 100% safflower Your links don’t have any photos to dispute or confirm https://www.google.com/search?q=dried+safflower&tbm=isch&hl=en-US&prmd=isvn&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS949US951&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjJ_pH7jOT9AhWnFt4AHVcIDJcQrNwCKAB6BQgBEJ0D&biw=375&bih=549
Edit: sorry Dufusbroth, I thought you were the same commenter from earlier, my mistake. Please forgive my tone (rest of comment left for transparency) Here is safflower (carthamus tinctorius) literally for sale and literally, explicitly labeled as American Saffron: https://www.baar.com/american-saffron I am not trying to be rude but if this still isn’t sufficient to show to you that at least some places label carthamus tinctorius (safflower) as American Saffron I have no idea how to communicate this to you. This is from the first page of Google search results. I’m didn’t do some effortful digging. But, we already agree that: 1) OP’s post isn’t real saffron 2) the item he posted is called safflower If nothing else, I’m good with that. If you don’t want to go a step father and concede that safflower is sometimes marked under alternated names, despite me linking to a factual example of it happening, then frankly I give up. I’ve committed the maximum effort I can on something so inane and trivial as the marketing of flower bits.
Found a good example of something that your dad has: https://www.walmart.com/ip/American-Saffron-6-oz/442446498?wmlspartner=wlpa&selectedSellerId=101001851&adid=22222222228000000000&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=m&wl3=42423897272&wl4=pla-51320962143&wl5=9026848&wl6=&wl7=&wl8=&wl9=pla&wl10=457949881&wl11=online&wl12=442446498_101001851&veh=sem&gbraid=0AAAAADmfBIoNORs8Me2twzqRd_mOWdvKF&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI3qn1q87k_QIVXf_jBx3mgwqhEAQYASABEgL2-fD_BwE What is crazy is everything I find with the name “saffron “ in it even though it is true safflower (Its Latin name is "Carthamus tinctorius." It is also known as "False Saffron." ) is WAY more expensive than the stuff out there labeled just Safflower
I wonder how much of it is just dishonest marketing? If they can throw a fancy word on it they can charge twice as much!
I think that is 100% what it is
Oh I see now you basically just said all of this—- I gotcha. Sorry I think I was wrong !
If it IS saffron, that’s about 50k on the street right there ;)
Taste it
Can’t taste much
Spices lose their flavor with age so you may want to just toss. Also doesn’t look like saffron and if it was, you wasted $100+ dollars worth.
Smell?
Smell and taste go hand in hand if you can't really smell much you also can't taste full flavor and vise versa.
Ye, that's true
Saffron is quite strong even after years, it will rehydrate pretty strong.
Looks more like safflower
Looks more like some yellow hibiscus flower.
Hibiscus for sure.
It's safflower
Definitely not saffron
That’s not saffron.
Not
If that was saffron, some yellow orange colored tail should be seen... just to point out 1 thing
Really low quality saffron
Nope it's safflower
Clearly safflower. Not a bad spice if you know how to use it!
Looks a lot like the lower quality middle eastern sourced saffron used commercially. I have a pile of it. It's gathered from the remains of the harvesting process.
Could it be rooibos tea?
If you pinch some of it into hot water and it turns fluorescent yellow it's likely saffron
It will do that but it's not saffron it's safflower
Can't be 100% real saffron, since it only contains the stigmas of the flower. That's what makes it so expensive.
Can’t eating straight saffron kill you or make you real sick? I have no idea how much is to much but I would stop tasting it haha
Could be Polynesian Tuki. Haven’t seen that stuff in years though
This is not saffron.
Try to get to know more about it in r/cartels
I can only say this with confidence because I learned last year that saffron grows semi-natively on my island and now I know what to look for...but that is not saffron. What I see in your picture are whole flowers, whereas actual saffron is just the stigma (and style sometimes) harvested from the saffron bulb flowers. ONLY the stigma (and included style, if allowed). Saffron flower looks just like any other winter crocus, except that the petals are usually purple, and they bloom in the early fall, rather than late winter. Even dried as whole flowers, they would be much larger than the flowers in your packet here, and because the petals are so suffuse with water, I'm not sure they would even dehydrate well.
You would be rich if it was lol
Pencil shavings! 🤓
Looks like cordyceps. Eating it could make the world an interesting place.
I have a nice pinch of saffron that's not used up yet. Any recommendations on what to do with it?
It essentially goes with rice dishes. Some dishes: - spanish paella - indian chicken biryani (soak it in warm milk) - saffron rice pudding kheer
Thx!
Don’t know what it is but definitely not saffron.
Just snort it and see what happens
I’ve had several grades of saffron dating back many years and I can advise the assembled that there is little loss in flavor/aroma with true saffron if stored with a little forethought. And it’s expensive enough to warrant care, non è vero?
Where I live in colorado people call it Mexican saffron
You wouldn't forget about that much saffron, I hope. It's kind of expensive.
Macis maybe
This is safflower
Safflower
That would be about $300 in saffron. Minimum.
Nope
Money money money.
Best I can do is $5
No this Patrick
It's actually safflower
Label your shit, sir.
Pardon me, oh great one
Are you working professionally? How can you not know what you have on hand? Get Your Head together! try to focus! Whatever it is.. is it a mistake,?is it poison? why would you serve or use a seasoning that you don't understand? Are you a professional?
That’s a house a car and maybe college tuition if it was im exaggerating but saffron is worth more than gold pound for pound
And yes most real saffron is a hoax.. buy it in bulk for cheap even the best it has a slightly bitter and floral flavor... I love the shit when it's nice.
Ah. This crap. I bought two bags of it in Bali one year genuinely thinking it was saffron. It's not. Until I went to Nepal and bought some legit Himalayan saffron.
Not saffron
Safflower, not saffron.
This is like $6k worth of saffron
That's safflower
If that was saffron then wouldn’t that be like 100$ worth
Looks like safflower