Terry Noonan has expensive tastes. He likes Spanish paella, which must have saffron. He likes his curries served with saffron rice. Twelve years ago, impressed by the price he was paying for saffron, he investigated the possibilities of growing it for himself.
Soon he and his wife Nicky were in business, although still holding on to their day jobs. They imported 5000 bulbs from the Netherlands, got permission from quarantine authorities to plant them at their property at Glaziers Bay overlooking the Huon River, and dreamed of the day when their crop of the most expensive spice in the world would hit 500 grams.
Saffron comes from the stigma of a crocus – three to each mauve flower. Once the sun comes out, the flowers open quickly over a five-week period starting at the end of March. There’s no such thing as mechanised picking of this crop, and although they are lightweight, picking saffron is hard on the back.
Then the stigma are plucked from each bloom by hand. At this stage, the saffron lacks its signature aroma and has no flavour, this only develops after the stigma are dried – losing about 80 per cent of their weight in the process. It takes the stigma from about 200,000 blooms to produce 1kg of saffron.
Although the bulbs can be lifted and separated each year, it took Terry and Nicky a long time to reach the 500g target. This was partly because of terrible weather a couple of years running in the early days, but then because every year they were selling corms to other growers, until this year, they have a network of 30 growers, mostly here, but also some in New South Wales and Victoria.
Tas-Saff buys the saffron back from its growers and markets the crop. Much of it is sold in small glass phials containing 0.1 of a gram – but that is enough to flavour and colour a couple of dishes.
Last month, Tas-Saff was named the Telstra Tasmanian Small Business of the Year and won the State Government micro business award. This month they will see how they fare in the national finals.
The Noonan’s business fits without pinching into the micro business category – those with between one and five employees, a far cry from the world’s top saffron company, which sells 25 tonnes a year. It operates in Iran, where 500,000 people are employed each year to pick the national crop.
Because it’s so valuable, saffron has been adulterated – with turmeric, with marigolds, with red dye. Punishment for such chicanery has been severe – one man was burned on a bonfire of his own “saffronâ€. Pure saffron gives up its colour slowly.
A cup of saffron tea is said to be a nerve tonic. It’s a rich source of Vitamin B2, riboflavin. It has been called both a calmative and an aphrodisiac and is said to aid digestion. The 15th century herbalist Culpepper warned that you could die laughing from over-indulgence of saffron.
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