Liven Up Bland Egg Salad With One Flowery Ingredient

While delicious, the simple egg salad: eggs, mayo, mustard can get a little tired. Maybe you've tried swapping out cottage cheese for egg salad without mayo or tried incorporating some spices to elevate your egg salad, like dill and paprika — that makes sense, right? But a flower? Hold tight, we're not talking about adding rose petals or anything here, and you may not have even realized this spice is derived from flowers at all. The perfect ingredient to liven up your egg salad is saffron.

Saffron threads are actually the interior stigmas — the part of the plant that collects pollen for fertilization — of a flower called crocus sativus, or the saffron crocus. Saffron is one of the world's most expensive spices because each flower only contains a few stigmas, and they're harvested by hand. So, it takes dozens and dozens of individual flowers and quite a lot of labor to produce a single small jar of the stuff.

Luckily, you don't need a lot of saffron to up your egg salad game. Just a pinch of the bright red spice mixed in with your regular egg salad easily takes it from run-of-the-mill to totally inspired. Saffron is so sought after because the flavor is incredibly complex, giving a floral, honeyed sweetness with earthy, grassy undertones and a slight peppery finish. Your egg salad will never be the same. For the full French treatment, try adding some minced shallots, minced cornichons, and a touch of herbes de provence along with the saffron.

Add a touch of class to your morning routine with toasted, ground saffron. Sprinkle some on top of your fried egg or add it to an omelet. Simply whisk a pinch in with the eggs and a touch of milk or cream. It works great to bring out the sweetness of veggie omelets and can hold up to just about any ingredient. Saffron is also beautiful in deviled eggs, in place of, or in addition to the regular paprika. And they look picture-perfect garnished with a couple of saffron strands.

If you'd like to avoid all the effort a paella entails, try a paella-inspired egg scramble with shrimp, garlic, and saffron, served over crispy rice. Saffron also makes a great addition to shakshuka or eggs in purgatory and melds perfectly with the sweet and slightly spicy tomato base. Whether simple or elaborate, saffron brings out the best in eggs, so for a touch of extravagance, reach for the saffron jar.