Of War and Épice: The Transition from Soldier to Saffron Merchant
It is the most expensive and perhaps the most labor-intensive spice in the world. Chefs fortunate enough to have access treat it like gold and savor it in their most cherished dishes. An average of 60,000 handpicked crocus blossoms are needed to collect one pound of saffron, and that pound could fetch upwards of $5000 depending on its quality and origin. Now, this most precious of spices can be delivered to anyone’s mailbox, beautifully packaged and within a week when ordered from RumiSpice.com.
RumiSpice, a purveyor of sustainably farmed Afghan saffron, is the brainchild of former U.S. Army captain Kimberly Jung and her team of former U.S. military veterans and Afghan partners. Their recipe for success in bringing their premium and fair-trade saffron to the US market is to know Afghan saffron as well as their military drills.
Despite its price tag and rarity, saffron is actually a widely known and celebrated spice. Throughout the Persianate and Central Asian cultures, with Afghanistan included, it has a cultural and culinary reverence unmatched by any other spice, with many dishes featuring at least a pinch for its sweet, earthy tones. In India and throughout South and Southeast Asia, this reverence is taken a step further; Kashmiri saffron was once used to dye holy Buddhist and Hindu robes. Saffron is also widely used around the Mediterranean and throughout Spanish-influenced cultures in Latin America. Foodies in the United States are increasingly amongst its admirers.
However, RumiSpice was not all about business for Kimberly and her teammates. She shared that this venture as a way of delivering on what she feels is “an unfulfilled promise” to Afghanistan, a country where she and her teammates served. The daughter of immigrant parents, Kimberly grew up in southern California knowing she wanted to see the world while equally keen on serving her country. Therefore, it was only natural that Kimberly graduated from West Point with a degree in engineering and was soon enough stationed in Afghanistan, where she witnessed firsthand the daily hardships and triumphs of the Afghani people.
After her service, Kimberly came up with the idea to assist the people of Afghanistan while pursuing an MBA at Harvard Business School. Using her education and her field experience, she created a plan for connecting rural Afghan Saffron farmers to purchasers worldwide.
When asked ‘why saffron?’ – as opposed to other common commodities from Afghanistan like apricots or sultanas – Kimberly of course laid out the practical reasons along with the delicately passionate ones.
First off, saffron is more lucrative considering its gross value.
“It’s a matter of low cost margin and availability,” Kimberly added, as she explained that 80% of Afghanistan’s economy is still dependent on agriculture. Given also its light weight and the low concern of spoilage, saffron is ideal for a productive export commodity for a landlocked nation such Afghanistan. The marketplace for this generations-old, precious Afghan culinary commodity became nearly extinct due to decades of civil and international strife. Rumispice’s mission is to build the agricultural and manufacturing infrastructure necessary to provide Afghan farmers with a direct market to produce and sell saffron globally.
RumiSpice’s saffron was recently featured in NooshTube + Dinner Lab’s “Dinner on the Silk Road” series of culinary events, where I had the opportunity to – at the risk of sounding cliché – “honor” my recipes with this prized Afghanistan sourced spice. Needless to say, it was one of the most refined saffron I used in my long usage of the spice.
For Kimberly, everyone is connected in this venture, even the 13th century Persian mystic and poet, Rumi, the company’s namesake. Rumi was born and raised in present-day Afghanistan, but later fled to the safety of present-day Turkey. Just like Rumi’s many quatrains and odes, saffron is also a product of care and love, almost bordering divinity. Given also its many medical benefits and the reverence in which it is held, it was only befitting that she coupled this spice with an equally prolific figure.
In our partnerships with RumiSpice, we at NooshTube have seen firsthand the dedication to cultural and culinary dialogue in Kimberly and her fellow teammates—from U.S. veterans to Afghani farmers. We are inspired by their passion for using saffron to help the Afghani people, and for helping to build a foundation for peace and prosperity.