Argyle Australia Saffron

Once upon a time there was an Aussie girl named Angela, and a Kiwi boy named Brendon, and their two little girls, Poppy and Saffron (yes, they love Saffron that much!!). With a lifelong ambition to get back to their country roots, and a passion for amazing produce, in 2016 they took a deep breath and packed up and moved from their lives, friends, family and corporate jobs in Sydney, to Orange.

The climate in Orange is perfect for Saffron, which likes 4 distinct seasons to thrive. So, after a lot of soil testing, backbreaking ground preparation, care, learning and love, they hand planted around 80,000 saffron corms on their property just outside Orange on the foothills of Mt Canoblas. From there, Argyle Australian Saffron was born.

Saffron is harvested by hand, for approximately 30 days around Easter each year. The Argyles get up early in the morning, hand pick 7,000-15,000 flowers each day, then sit and carefully extract the three precious, red stigmas by hand. It takes the stigmas from around 250 flowers to produce just 1 Gram of saffron. The Argyles then use a special drying method, unique they believe to anyone in Australia, which involves using humidity in their drying process. Studies have shown this quickly locks in maximum crocin content, and the result is maximum colour, flavour and aroma.

This family business now produce some of the highest quality saffron in the world, receiving rave reviews from Chefs and foodies Australia wide. Their saffron is especially potent, requiring only a fraction of what you would usually use in dishes. Brendon and Angela and their daughters are passionate about doing what they love, to provide special, unique and premium saffron products to their customers.