I found this hard to believe, but confirmation bias is a hell of a drug, so I ran my own quick blinded experiment: 3 cups of hot water, one of which had a small pinch of saffron swirled around in it, one with a 1/4 tsp of turmeric, one plain.

That it was trivial to tell which was which is an understatement. There's a floral sweetness to saffron that is absolutely unmistakable to me.

Sorry this is ridiculous. Not all saffron is equal. Iranian saffron is so pungent that just opening a container of it will have folks be able to smell it across the room.

This stuff is usually locked up in Indian/middle eastern supermarkets.

Turmeric and Saffron are completely different.

Turmeric has an earthy taste

Saffron is mostly fragrance/smell. No idea what it tastes like. We use it in rice dishes or sometimes in my turmeric milk drink.

Edit: In other words, to figure out if something has saffron, you smell it.

Saffron has a slightly bitter taste, but unless you're making something like a syrup for gulab jamun which can have a pretty large amount of saffron you're unlikely to use enough to feel it in foodstuffs.

> No idea what it tastes like.

Then what's the point of including it in dishes like paella, where any fragrance will be drowned out by all of the other spices and flavors in the dish?

It doesn't get drowned. Spices add both taste and aroma, and saffron has a pretty strong aroma that you can taste the aroma.

Hard to describe, easier to experience..

Generally it's very hard to prove a negative. I can definitely smell the difference in saffron and non-saffron rice dishes. There are plenty of people who can't distinguish between say roses and coffee but the distinction definitely exists.

Here's a weird thing: I don't have any idea what saffron tastes like. Ignoring saffron rice (which to me seems exactly like ordinary rice, but yellow -- which probably means it didn't really have saffron in it?), I've only had dishes that include it (that I knew of) a couple of times in my life. Those dishes had many different flavors going on, so I couldn't tell which of those flavors were saffron.

I need to just get some and make a tea or something with it so I know what it tastes like.

St Lucia’s buns

I've had those, but it didn't clarify anything for me. I think the issue is that I don't know what taste I'm looking for, so I can't pick it out. That's why I think the solution is to try saffron in isolation from other flavors, so there's no question.

Saffron ice cream.

TIL that saffron ice cream is a thing that exists. It's certainly not in any store in my area that I am aware of, so I'm afraid that I can't try it.

Was there no difference in fragrance either? Saffron imparts a very distinct fragrance, more than taste. And that fragrance affects perceived taste. In larger quantities, it has a bitter-ish taste. I use it in rice puddings, greek yogurt (simplest recipe possible - yogurt, sugar, cardamom powder and few threads of saffron. Big difference with and without saffron).

I never noticed a difference in the odor of saffron rice and regular rice. But as I said in a different comment, I take this to mean that I've never had saffron rice that actually had saffron in it.

I believe you diluted it too much

Easy to burn the flavor off

I used saffron mainly for paella and some seafood dishes. The flavor is definitely distinctive although subtle.

You might have mistaken safflower for saffron, the former is a colouring agent.

I find that hard to believe because to me, personally, saffron has such a disgusting taste that I would taste three miles against the wind on any given day of the week.

I'll stick to tumeric, too.