Saffron as an Antidepressant (2018) | Hacker News Reader

Saffron as an Antidepressant (2018)

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

122 pointsgdubs104 comments

I feel like people in the west need to become more familiar with Persian cooking. Every year I learn that one more ingredient that we commonly use in Persian cooking is good for your health. So based on this definitive evidence I'm gonna conclude everything we eat is good for you. To get you ahead here are some other things to try:

1. Sabzi Khordan: Elevate your breakfast with Sabzi Khordan, a mixed of herbs that are commonly eaten as breakfast with cheese and walnuts.

2. Drink properly brewed tea: If your idea of tea is what you get from Starbucks, you don't know what tea is. Try Persian brewed black tea.

3. Persian barberry rice: Try Persian style rice cooked with rice, salt, butter, barberries, and saffron.

4. Add turmeric to pretty much every stew.

5. Try Fesenjan, Ghormeh Sabzi, and Khoresh Gheymeh.

It's not unique to Persian cooking, but there is wisdom in most cultural foods. I have been cooking a lot during the pandemic and every month I discover a new fermented food that has "recently" been found to be a superfood - kombucha, kefir, kimchi, soy sauce, mole sauce, sourdough etc. That is not to talk about other ingredients like turmeric, chiles, lentils and other stuff that add nutritional value.

EDIT: I wanted to add something I just remembered from the Netflix docuseries "Cooked" - "If you were to eat grains and nothing but grains, you will die sooner rather than later from lack of one nutrient or another. But if you were to eat real fermented bread made from the same grains, you will live much longer". Something about fermentation is truly nourishing.

I remember listening to an NPR story 2 or 3 decades ago which I can't find about how White people in the United States (probably referring to health food eating yuppies in NYC and Northern California) adopted a staple diet very close to an African American diet in the 40's and 50's while the modern African American diet more often included what White people were eating in the 40's and 50's.

If anyone has any links to stories about how diets have change by demographics over time in the United States, please share.

Sweet potatoes?

IMHO, they may be healthier than eating only white bread, but "recently been found to be superfood" is a euphemism for "this food now has enough consumers in your country to bootstrap a self-sustaining PR cycle."

Did you know kimchi is supposed to boost your immune system and protect you against COVID? Now you know - go buy some! (And please pay no attention to the high rate of colon cancers in Korea, which may or may not be related, who knows.)

I like the super good marketing thing, but...What makes you think kimchi is a more likely cause of that unsourced colon cancer claim than the massive amounts of tasty meat in Korean BBQ?

Hmm... from the very scientific method of googling for news articles, you may be right. Should have used stomach cancer instead (another cancer prevalent in Korea) - for stomach, salty/spicy food is considered a potential reason, it seems.

This may just be more an artifact that foods are complex enough that a great many foods can be characterized as super-foods. Also probably none of them really have any profound effect on overall health. If you get old you will have seen many, many dietary miracles come and go where nothing much came of them.

I always rather liked the original simple idea of Paleo style eating.

Which was unprocessed foods consumed in quantity and variation that maybe is a bit like our ancestors consumption patterns.

But sadly Paleo for co-opted by the Keto crowd and it's all about hi-fat diets and Lo-carb blah blah blah. :-)

I agree with you, but a quick note for potential readers: most of the soy sauce from your grocery store has extreme amounts of salt in it, beware.

Yes, you will want to look for "Shoyu" in a regular grocery store that will probably be made of fermented soy beans. You could also make the trip out to an Asian grocery store - a simple yet effective way to start an adventure :)

Most American grocery store soy sauce is also not authentic soy sauce. Soy sauce has to be aged from soy, salt, wheat, and a fermentation starter. American grocery store soy sauce is typically salt water with flavor additives.

Ingredients for a cheap American soy sauce: soybean, corn, water, sugar, sodium benzoate, salt, caramel color, monosodium glutamate, citric acid, potassium sorbate.

As a big counterexample, Kikkoman is popular enough in the USA to carry in mainstream grocery stores, and is a legitimate soy sauce. I go to the Korean market here when I can for soy sauce (in which case I often get Sempio 501 or 701), but when I don't have time for a separate trip for some reason, I get Kikkoman from the big-box store and it's perfectly reasonable. The level of salt is still relevant, though.

If you start getting into different kinds of legit soy sauce then you'll find more subtle differences of course, and depending on what you're cooking, they may be relevant. I don't cook at home with enough precision for the difference between “primary” soy sauces to matter much, but if you start learning an actual cuisine, that's different.

(No affiliation.)

I haven't been actually keeping track, but I can't recall a time I was in a store with only one brand of soy sauce and it wasn't Kikkoman. Maybe just because I'm in California though?

Most American stores have San-J brand sauces which are a better alternative. Doesn’t really stop a lot of people from picking the bad stuff.

Tamari is a good answer to this problem (soy sauce made without wheat). Depending on the brand it has less salt than regular soy sauce and, as it has a richer flavour, you need less of it.

I still want to try Japanese Natto but can't find it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natt%C5%8D

Supposed to taste quite bad for Westerners.

I think most people who haven't tried it before wouldn't object to the taste of natto as much as its texture, it's got a very unusual kind of slimy+sticky quality that lets you pull long strings of slime between the soybeans. But people usually eat it with rice, and if you mix it up it's not quite as odd. I don't mind it, but I rarely eat it...

I tried it at a food court in a Japanese supermarket in the Chicago suburbs (Mitsuwa) Perhaps if you have any Japanese supermarkets near you you could find some.

I (who grew up in rural IL) really enjoyed the taste and the smell. The consistency took some getting used to.

Having tried stinky tofu and been unable to stand it, I stay away from anything similar.

I rely on aged cheese to get my bacteria byproducts (esp. Vitamin K2).

Stinky tofu in Taiwan smelt as though someone had burried their colostomy bag (adding maybe rubbish and some milk to curdle it) for a couple of months and opened it at the dinner table. Fetid doesn’t even cover it. I’m amazed you ate it. Natto by comparison is just a bit like gross cheese.

Stinky tofu smells a little funky, but once you take a bite, it’s juicy and savory. Taiwanese stuff definitely stinks more, but the mainland Chinese varieties don’t really stink at all and retain a savory taste.

Natto literally has the smell and slimy, sticky texture of, well, semen. It’s easy to wonder whether someone left a bunch of used tissues out or if they simply forgot to toss out their used natto package.

> semen

Interestingly, natto is one of the few foods high in a substance called spermadine. Look it up. Supposedly contributes to longevity and supplements exist.

Thanks for the great description. Now I have to look up “stinky tofu” since I’ve never heard of it.

Stinky tofu is like the blue cheese of tofus. It's quite nice.

Natto ... I'm not such a fan.

good god was stinky tofu awful when i tried it. smelled like sock and tasted worse. I almost want to see if my tastes have changed enough over the years to appreciate it now but back then it was simply awful.

How do you know when it’s gone rancid?

it was an actual dish that is popular in china and not spoiled food. traditionally it's fermented.

I know. I’m asking if it goes bad, how would you even know when the smell is bad before it is rancid.

You'd be wise to be careful with stinky tofu, at least in many places.

The safest methods simply marinate tofu in fermented amaranth; the tofu itself isn't aged. But there's many approaches to it with and without questionable safety practices. I'm not sure comparisons to blue cheese or koji-fermented products are appropriate.

https://roadsandkingdoms.com/2019/stinky-tofu-in-shaoxing/

I have some Thai fermented tofu in my fridge. It tastes like a very strong soft cheese.

Here in NJ I could find it in an Asian supermarket (in the freezers).

Go Go Curry in NYC has it

In the 70's it was yogurt.

Yogurt is still going strong, isn't it?

So strong that it's a little odd to think about it as having once been trendy. For the three decades I've spent on this planet it's just always been there.

Yeah, but now it has been made into a dessert with lots and lots of sugar that it’s unclear if it’s good or bad for faith in the sugared forms.

Saffron is used pretty heavily in Indian and Spanish cuisine too. Indian food is pretty good example of a cuisine with all sorts of ingredients with beneficial health properties (including good tea) but is also loaded with fat, starch and sugar. European cuisine is not too dissimilar. There's health benefits of ingredients like cinnamon, garlic and coffee but not when you mix them with high-calorie garbage.

It would seem that the rate of depression should be lower in cultures where it's used more. I'm curious about rather existing statistics indicate that.

> So based on this definitive evidence I'm gonna conclude everything we eat is good for you

More conclusive evidence that everything we eat is good for you [1], I recently discovered skyr, a traditional Icelandic dairy product [2] with an unusually high protein/calories ratio.

It looks and tastes very much like the homemade yogurt of my grandma, "māst kise-i." And the preparation procedure of skyr and māst kise-i are almost the same.

Anyway, skyr is good for you. It replaces the protein shake, plus it has the other nutrients of a good dairy product, goes with all kinds of foods, and costs no more than yogurt.

[1] :P

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyr

Another interesting product is Kefir: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kefir

It's a bit like liquid yogurt.

6. chips o mast ;)

But I disagree with the tea.

I thought about this and I think the way the persian drink tea might be a sign of economic hardship: we put a handful of dried tea leaves in a pot and brew it ad infinitum on the samavar. This causes the tea to over brew and let out a very bitter taste, but also allows for a longer lasting supply. Then to counter the bitterness we add rock candy or sugar to it.

I prefer to brew the black tea in hot water but not too much; I still like saffron rock candy in it some times; but at this point my ancestral guilt is ablaze cause its a luxury to throw away tea for a cup when u can squeeze a pot out of it.

Do you call the barberry rice pilaf or plov? It's popular in Eastern Europe and it's so much tastier than the rice cooked in the western world.

Yes. We call it "Zereshk Polo". I didn't know it's also popular in eastern Europe. Interesting!

Fesenjan, Ghormeh sabzi, Muhamarra, the dill rice - I could eat Persian food every day!

Wouldn't we be able to look at societies that ate certain foods to see if they lived longer/more healthy lives? I think that'd be a smoking gun for which foods have the most beneficial ingredients.

Too many degrees of freedom to be useful in practice, although people have tried this in the past. Mediterranean diet notably had been suggested from these style studies.

Fesenjan is the meal of the gods. It looks disgusting but its one of the best dishes Ive had in a while. Its just magical how persians came up with it! Also Sohan and Lavashak are freaking amazing!

> Persian brewed black tea

Can you buy this in stores? Brand preference?

Similar taste can be achieved with non-Persian tea. I think brewing method maybe more important. For the brand I buy loose leaf english breakfast and use a transparent teapot to see when the tea is ready. Usually takes ~5 minutes for the perfect taste.

Tea: https://teapigs.com/products/english-breakfast?_sid=3aed062b... (choose the loose leaf version)

Teapot: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KIW0T9C

$8 for shipping is a bit steep for a $9 bag of tea. Any other loose-leaf recommendations? Thanks for both this and the pot recommendation!

Sadaf is a staple. I'm a fan of the cardamom varieties.

It can be hard to find the right cheese for sabzi khordan. Also some people find drinking tea out of the saucer weird.

> Also some people find drinking tea out of the saucer weird.

I love drinking out of the saucer. It taste different than drinking from a cup. It taste different drinking from a stainless steel cup vs glass cup too.

My favorite saucer is Corelle butterfly gold.

I was very interested in Laura Ingalls Wilder when I was younger, as a result of reading her Little House on the Prairie books. An anecdote about her father, Charles “Pa” Ingalls drinking from the saucer always stayed with me. Thanks for teaching me that saucer drinking is still alive and well. https://henscratches.wordpress.com/2017/01/18/wilder-wednesd...

Saucer is optional. I drink directly from the cup. Make sure the cup is made of clear glass though to see the color of the tea.

Why does where you drink from it matter, let alone its transparency?

Dunno about Persian style tea; but the pu’erh I often drink tastes significantly better from a sake cup vs a “normal” double walled bodum tea glass. I can’t really explain why, cup shape does affect hiw much you drink per sip, maybe the nose is involved.. Or it’s all bollocks and completely in my head.

Either way, sake cup is the way to go for puerh ;)

Of course ... Makes sense now, thanks! Someone mentioned below that drinking from a metal cup compared with glass tastes different, which again makes sense to me.

Where do you buy your pu'erh? I'll have to buy some, plus a sake cup it seems!

From Mei Leaf usually (see if you can get ahold of their tub highness it’s my favourite young Sheng), not cheap though.

Real puerh is very good for you. Anecdotal obviously but descendants on my father's side eat healthy and drink a lot of puerh daily, regularly live to 100+.

Can't speak to the glass. But I find tea tastes awful out of a metal thermos.

Actually color can affect the perceived taste. Red/vibrant colors make the drink taste more sweet.

Upon reflection, I have experienced this so it all makes sense now. Thanks.

I believe they meant that the color of the tea matters, as an indicator of how thoroughly/well it's been brewed, rather than the fact that you can see it or not.

Do you drink wine, or anything where you even occasionally care how 'open' the glass is? A saucer's way more open than a cup. I'm sure there are vicious debates over flutes vs. saucers on champagne-appreciation.net forums or whatever!

Not at all the same, but texture too. Meringues are I think the best example of that.

Totally agree.

Berberine, found in Barberries, seems to have very interesting properties:

Cancer fighting: MDM2 inhibition-mediated autophagy contributes to the pro-apoptotic effect of berberine in p53-null leukemic cells https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31881227

Synergistic antitumor effect of melatonin with several chemotherapeutic drugs on human Ewing sarcoma cancer cells: potentiation of the extrinsic apoptotic pathway https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20025643

Melatonin inhibits AP-2β/hTERT, NF-κB/COX-2 and Akt/ERK and activates caspase/Cyto C signaling to enhance the antitumor activity of berberine in lung cancer cells https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4823085/

Anticancer effect of berberine based on experimental animal models of various cancers: a systematic review and meta-analysis https://bmccancer.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12885-...

Berberine enhances chemosensitivity to irinotecan in colon cancer via inhibition of NF‑κB https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24173769/

Berberine and Curcumin Target Survivin and STAT3 in Gastric Cancer Cells and Synergize Actions of Standard Chemotherapeutic 5-Fluorouracil https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01635581.2015.1...

Pre-treatment with berberine enhances effect of 5-fluorouracil and cisplatin in HEP2 laryngeal cancer cell line https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29460537

Decreasing blood glucose levels (beneficial for cancer patients as well)`: Efficacy of Berberine in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2410097/

Liu S., Fang Y., Shen H., Xu W., Li H.: Berberine sensitizes ovarian cancer cells to cisplatin through miR-21/PDCD4 axis. Acta. Biochim. Biophys. Sin., 2013; 45: 756-762

Pandey M.K., Sung B., Kunnumakkara A.B., Sethi G., Chaturvedi M.M., Aggarwal B.B.: Berberine modifies cysteine 179 of IκBα kinase, suppresses nuclear factor-κB-regulated antiapoptotic gene products, and potentiates apoptosis. Cancer Res., 2008; 68: 5370-5379

But apparently dosage is key, and there is such a thing as too small a dose!

Hormetic Effect of Berberine Attenuates the Anticancer Activity of Chemotherapeutic Agents https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4589364/

Sodium Caprate promotes absorptions of Berberine in the intestine https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20237966/

Also barberries tastes good.

I was taking berberine, it can wreck your stomach if you don’t take it with some food, I was advised that by my doctor and then realized why. I was only taking it once a day too.

I think the psychoactive effects of dietary ingredients are really interesting, and an area of research that deserves more attention.

"Even in their usual intake range, a variety of spices including vanilla, black pepper, cacao, chili peppers, cloves, saffron, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and turmeric have been described as having mild effects on mood"

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2019.0059...

I think we have relatively little understanding of how these psychoactive effects interact with co-ingestion of other ingredients. Certain ingredients can alter the metabolism of other ingredients (ex. black pepper and tumeric both inhibit MAO, potentiate each other and potentiate other ingredients). I find it plausible that some sort of 'spiced stew' consumed at a particular frequency could have clinically significant levels of therapeutic effect.

Also plausible that a significant source of variance in pharmacological drugs' effects are due to differences in diet.

Ex. are there statistically significant differences in the effects of SSRIs between patients with (high || low) use of black pepper/turmeric in their diets?

Me and my gf once had Samosas that had an amazing effect, both aphrodisiacal and just feelings of contentment.

This seems to be combining a couple of studies; the primary one seems to be 40 people over 6 weeks using the petals of saffron (but in another place said "leaves", so I'm not sure which is correct), but it's interesting that the petals have the effect and not just the stigma which is what is called "saffron" for cooking

They also mentioned that it _might_ work by affecting serotonin in the brain, but no one actually knows yet; and in the conclusion they mention how this is only a first step at understanding the effects.

So: looks kind of promising, but by no means a finished study yet. (also there were warnings about taking too much as it can be toxic and damaging for pregnancy so... read that carefully before buying some I suppose :) )

>> They also mentioned that it _might_ work by affecting serotonin in the brain, but no one actually knows yet;

I don't even think we know with regards to any substance, i.e even why SSRI work - I think we have some good hypothesis, but nothing conclusive. I've even seen an ad on CNN for tardive dyskinesia that says 'the <drug> is thought to do something to dopamine' - Doesn't exactly inspire confidence but having suffered from mental conditions, I'd still be willing to try it.

As you mention, most SSRI ads specifically note that it is thought to work by inhibiting serotonin reuptake...maybe. There isn't even strong proof that serotonin plays the part popularly believed.

But SSRIs work for many people, and do seem to have an effect, so the theoretical is good enough for now.

> As you mention, most SSRI ads specifically note that it is thought to work by inhibiting serotonin reuptake...maybe. There isn't even strong proof that serotonin plays the part popularly believed.

The "chemical imbalance" theory hasn't been taken seriously for decades. It's a myth that psychiatrists think that SSRIs are compensating for low serotonin. We've known for a long time that the actual anti-depressant effects come from somewhere downstream that isn't fully understood yet. This isn't really a new discovery. We've known from the start that SSRIs inhibit serotonin reuptake within hours of taking the first dose, but the full antidepressant effect can lag by weeks.

That doesn't mean that serotonin isn't involved in the therapeutic action of SSRIs, though. Occupying around 80% of the serotonin transporters is necessary to bring about the antidepressant effects of different SSRIs. So we do know that inhibiting serotonin reuptake is almost certainly the mechanism that kicks off the chain of events that ultimately produces the antidepressant effect, but we also know that the antidepressant effect doesn't come directly from this inhibition.

This is a good article that explains debunks the myth that psychiatry believes the "chemical imbalance" or "low serotonin" theories: https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/debunking-two-chemical...

Because SSRIs take weeks to work, it is theorized that they actual modify DNA expression and other things that are slow to action.

Serotonin itself has little to do with depression at the synaptic level

Yes, that's true; like you say, no one even quite knows how SSRIs work, so this looks promising! Hopefully future studies show similar effects without some of the SSRI side effects

Don't disregard scientific knowledge like that. Many (albeit not all) drugs have been extensively tested at least by close to exhaustively testing receptor binding sensitivity. Except for the extremely rare drugs that have very atypical action mechanism it allows to understand to a decent extent what it does pharmacologically. But also, understanding how a drug work isn't necessary for taking the risk of trying it given that most CNS (except DRA) drugs are "safe" especially if combined with potent neuroprotectors (anti oxidants, NMDA antagonists, etc) However even if the risk is low, I don't understand your motive to try it. The only one would be to advance scientific knowledge by self testing. But if the motive is for egoistic and not altruistic then there are much more proved antidepressants out there with small side effect profiles.

Oh - I muddled my phrasing - I agree with you, I was saying I would try a medication with historical, industry and regulatory backing even if we didn't understand exactly how it worked - not the saffron. That being said, I'm now planning to make paella...

why aren't DRA safe?

Well it was a simplification. I know that many dopamine releasing agents are safe, such as amantadine. However when a drug is a DRA + a dopamine reuptake inhibitor or worse reverse the transport of dopamin reuptake through TRAAR and / or is a dopamin agonist then there is a risk of neurotoxicity and of durably lowering dopamin receptor density in the brain. This also apply for other monoamines but to a lesser extent. Most of drugs that have this combination of action are https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substituted_phenethylamine Some are safe such as D-amphetamine (Adderall, Vyvanse) but most have an unknown risk. Note that you can regrow lost receptors to some extent with e.g Uridine.

You'd be amazed how little extra effort goes into pharmaceutical studies for antidepressants. They're mostly n<1k people, under 6months long, with no mechanism firmly established...

If you can't afford this antioxidant, try the slightly cheaper alternative: gold.

Effective dose of saffron is much smaller than that of gold :)

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=saffron+capsules

I have no idea if saffron "extract" is effectively the same thing though

In the UK and for vanilla at least, 'extract' must be extracted from the vanilla pod with a solution of alcohol; 'essence' is commonly used to market synthetic vanillin products. (I don't know if synthetic saffron even exists? For colouring purposes a mixture of turmeric & chilli powder - deggi mirch has particular vibrance - can be a good approximation for much less cost, but for flavour?)

I believe in general 'extract' refers to alcohol extraction, in support of that, Wikipedia says of the US:

> Natural vanilla flavoring is derived from vanilla beans with little to no alcohol. The maximum amount of alcohol that is usually present is only 2–3%. Therefore, by FDA regulations it cannot be called an extract.

As far as dosage:

“For chronic supplementation, take 15mg of saffron, twice a day. This is the advised upper limit for constant supplementation. Preliminary evidence suggests that doubling this dose may have a toxic effect after eight weeks of continuous usage. Acute, single doses of saffron, can be as high as 200mg.

Saffron can be supplemented by taking water extracts of the stigma (the red part of the plant, used as a spice) or by using the dehydrated stigma itself. Some evidence suggests that the petals of saffron may also be effective.

Saffron can be taken twice a day in a supplement form, or at meals as a spice.

Doses above 1,200mg may cause nasea and vomiting.”[0]

[0] https://examine.com/supplements/saffron/

(Also for those unaware, Examine.com is very good)

Fun fact: (maybe!)

Saffron is, per unit of weight, the most expensive thing you can buy in many supermarkets.

(That's my conjecture after noticing that the saffron in German supermarkets is about 10,000 to 30,000 EUR/kg, or 68,000 for the bio certified, hand picked, from a women-run enterprise:

https://shop.rewe.de/p/herbaria-safran-faeden/VJ7R7E3DA )

Any other contenders?

By weight?! Wow yeah, by far surely. Though by some sort of hand-wavy measure of 'amount you use', vanilla might take the lead.

Ignoring the whopping (!) 10g bulk buy, cheapest I can get from Ocado in the UK is £4.68 for a gram. Vanilla pods start at £3 each (and no cheaper on Amazon other than in big bags, happened to be looking recently) and when you use one you use one; whereas the saffron probably won't be used all at once, again for a hand-wavy notion of 'similar sort of style/quantity' thing (despite obviously being totally different if one has vanilla and the other saffron..).

Gift cards?

Ha, interesting, nice one. I just looked up that plastic credit cards weigh around 5 g, so a with a 50$ gift card you’d get close to the “cheap” saffron ($10,000/kg), but you’d need a 350$ or so gift card to beat the hand picked bio one.

I mean, who cares if it works medically as an antidepressant? Just thinking about eating anything with saffron in it automatically makes me feel happier. :)

Indian food uses a lot of saffron

Biryani - a rice dish with meat, spices and saffron

Kheer - a rice pudding with milk + cardamom + saffron + sugar

Since saffron is expensive, the right way to use it is to drop a few strings in a glass of water or milk and let it sit for a couple hrs. It really brings out the flavor. Then you can use it whatever dish you are cooking.

Anecdotal, but it's helped me out of more than one bout of depression. I take ~0.12g per day for ~12 weeks when I realize I'm in one. I don't know if the brand matters, but I started with high quality, so I'm not taking any chances on others. I take half of one of these sachets per day (cheaper at whole foods): https://www.amazon.com/Krokos-Kozanis-Saffron-Powder-Coopera...

Unrelated but interesting, many medieval recipes included saffron, especially in pie crusts (coffins).

https://giveitforth.blogspot.com/2019/03/harleian-ms-279-ab-...

This is from PubMed - public index of medical research, not an official stance of NIH.

They call it mellow yellow

Quite rightly!

Now I get why a popular xmas time pastry in Sweden is saffron-based.

TIL saffron is harmless in regular cooking, but toxic above 5g, and lethal above 20g. Most presentations are less than 5g anyway, because authentic saffron is expensive.

Isn't saffron ultra expensive? It is in my country, at least. Prohibitively so.

This paper uses the petals (in one case they say leaves, but everywhere else they way petals), specifically because they aren't as expensive - so it seems the petals have the same chemicals as the stigma for this test

Reads like an undergrad class project and not a real study

That's maybe a bit unfair, but yes, they could have run it by an editor proficient in English:

> In summary further research required to get a good quality data regarding saffron mechanism of action, effectiveness, and safety. [...] While results of increased mental wellness coupled with good short-term basic safety profile recommend saffron may be an exceedingly efficient alternative approach for the treating depression. It is at present unidentified that the positive results of saffron obtained during preliminary trials will proceeds in long-term health benefits until well-controlled and longer-term research are achieved.

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