LC Determination of Adulterated Saffron Prepared by Adding Styles Colored with Some Natural Colorants

A high-performance liquid chromatographic method previously developed (Lozano et al. in J Chromatogr A 830:477–483, 1999) for simultaneous detection, identification and quantification of the secondary metabolites in commercial saffron was extended for the detection of adulterated saffron prepared by adding styles colored with the natural colorants extracted from saffron petals, safflower, madder and red beet. The chromatograms of the methanol-water (50%, v/v) extracts of pure and adulterated saffron were obtained at the assayed wavelengths, 402 (or 254), 260 and 535 (or 440) nm and then by applying two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) to the obtained data the presence of the styles colored with the colorant of safflower (>14.3%), styles colored with the colorant of madder (>9.1%) and styles colored with the colorant of red beet (>14.3%) in saffron were significantly detected. But the detection of adulterated saffron prepared with the colorant of saffron petals was not successful.