Qaen Growers

Qaen Growers farm in Khorasan, the province that produces most of the world's saffron, and harvest only for sargol — the grade made from the red stigma tips alone, with none of the yellow style attached. Harvest happens for roughly three weeks each autumn, before sunrise, because the crocus flowers open and begin to lose potency within hours of first light. Each flower yields three stigmas, hand-picked by workers moving row by row across the fields, then dried the same day over gentle heat to lock in colour and aroma before any of it degrades. It takes tens of thousands of flowers to fill a single kilogram — the reason the spice commands the price it does, and the reason grading matters as much as it does here. Product reaches All The Good Things through a screened exporter working out of Khorasan.

Qaen Growers hand-harvest only the red tips of the crocus — sargol, the highest saffron grade — from the fields of Khorasan, where most of the world's saffron is grown.

Khorasan, Iran

That sargol grade only exists because someone decided the yellow style wasn't worth including.