Cornish Food Market

Bloomin’ delicious edible flowers

July 20, 2011 in Recipes | 0 comments

The list of edible flowers is long.  So used to eating the main part of the plant, be it the tuber, fruit or leaf we often forget about the colourful & delicious flower.

If you have ever eaten saffron, then you have tasted a part of a flower; saffron are the stamen which comes from a crocus plant and is used to give an elegant flavour to recipes and a noticeable golden colour. Similarly, we often see cloves used to stud Christmas hams or as a spice to flavour dishes.  Cloves are simply flower buds from a tree native to Indonesia which have been dried.

Little tasted are the flowers of common place fruit and veg that we already eat.  Brassicas such as kale and broccoli produce edible flowers, as do onions, fennel and squashes.  Courgette flowers, a feature in this week's newsletter, are an edible product which can be cooked in many ways such as carefully stuffing with a little ricotta or mozzarella and frying lightly in batter or even parmesan batter. The result is delicious and the flower gives a subtle taste of courgette.

Not all edible flowers have to be products of vegetables. Rose petals as well as lavender has been used in various recipes, and edible flower petals make a pretty edition to cheer up a salad or as cake decoration.