Plant these pretty—and pretty yummy—flowers in your yard, and you can enjoy their flavors as well as their beauty.
By ROL Staff, Rodale's Organic Life
Most flower gardens
are a feast for the eyes, and perhaps a smorgasbord of fragrances. But
by planting some edible species, your taste buds can get in on the act.
[post_ads]To help you cultivate a delicious garden, we asked Frank Stonaker, PhD,
an assistant professor in the horticulture and landscape architecture
department at Colorado State University about his favorite edible
flowers. You can try growing your own, or if you want to taste-test
before planting, pick some up at a specialty food market. (Before you
sample any from someone else’s garden, make certain they were grown
without pesticides or chemicals.)
(On just a quarter-acre of land, you can produce fresh, organic food for a family of four—year-round. Rodale's The Backyard Homestead shows you how; get your copy today.)
As the name suggests, the flowers of this
fast-growing herb have a pineapple-like fragrance, and a sweet taste
that’s reminiscent of honeysuckle. They’re so sweet, in fact, that they
often attract hummingbirds to your garden. The red blooms of this unique
sage plant make a tasty and colorful addition to fruit cocktails, or they can be candied and used to adorn cakes and cookies.
These sun-loving annuals bloom from midsummer
until the first frost, so they can flavor your food for the second half
of the summer and into fall. And you can use every part of the plant,
as the stems, leaves, and blossoms are all edible (and don’t need to be
cooked). The peppery-tasting flowers, which bloom in shades of bright
red and yellow (the red varieties actually taste spicier), look
beautiful as a garnish or can be used in sandwiches instead of mustard.
Or try chopping up the stems and leaves, which have a radish-like flavor, and tossing them in a salad. Try the nasturtium seed pods pickled, for a very close approximation of capers.
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Your herb garden may be filled with lavender-pink chive flowers
right about now (they start appearing in June), so why not sample some
tonight? When the flowers are just starting to open, pinch the blossom
off at the base then break apart the onion-flavored florets. Try
sprinkling them on salads, cooking them with fresh vegetables, or adding
them to casseroles. Just be sure to use them sparingly in recipes that
already call for a lot of onion, to avoid an overpowering flavor.
Thanks to the popularity of Mexican and
Italian cuisines, whose chefs often cook with these flowers, you may
have already sampled squash blossoms in dishes at local restaurants.
Thankfully, they’re a snap to prepare at home, too. The beautiful and
large blossoms from all kinds of squash—including both summer and winter
varieties, and even pumpkins—can be stuffed, breaded, and then fried
for a tasty appetizer. Or try them steamed them until wilted; drizzle
them with some olive oil, and enjoy. Just be sure to eat them soon after
picking, as they are extremely perishable and last only about a day.
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Want a new way to add some seasoning to your seafood? Add some angelica. Its celery-like
flavor works particularly well when paired with fish: You can mince the
leaves—which have a strong, clean taste—then use them in poaching
water. Some cooks will also add the leaves when cooking squash or
pumpkin to bring out those foods’ natural sweetness. The perennial is self-seeding, likes a bit of shade, and is generally easy to care for.
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