Thank you. I also get mine from NL, but it's not sold as dye - and it's about ~twice more expensive than your estimate above, assuming ~60mg per dose. Mind you, you called it legal in the EU above but I'm in :france-cool: and believe me, legal it's not - they even outlawed possession of Peganum Harmala (both the plant and the seeds) in this country. The plant fucking grows here, at least around the mediterranean. Though admittedly no cop would even know about either MHRB or Syrian Rue so it's mostly a moot point.

you want it powdered because that gives you more surface area for the extracting chemicals

I really experimented with both and with a longer initial boil for shredded, it really makes little difference in yield. Moreover, the whole extraction process became so much less of a headache for me when I bought a separatory funnel (if you haven't got one, I can't recommend it enough); and using the powdered form makes my funnel's plastic faucet gunk up - admittedly though that'd be solved by filtering the solution better first.