Smell Your Flowers and Eat Them Too!

Roses, pansies, nasturtiums and other flowers add wonderful color to your garden, but did you know you can eat some of these flowers, too? Some everyday foods we eat, such as artichoke and broccoli, are flower buds.

* Edible flowers frozen in ice cubes enliven cold beverages.

* Hibiscus flowers make marvelous teas.

* Flowers and leaves of nasturtium are good in salads.

* Many popular flowers such as fox glove, Carolina (yellow) jasmine, heavenly bamboo (nandina), ivy, lantana, lobelia, oleander, periwinkle, pittosporum, potato flowers and sweet pea are poisonous.

* When it comes to flower eating, organic growing is best. If eating flowers is new to you, go at it slowly. Some people are allergic to flowers. However, even given all of the warnings, certain flowers make a tasty and colorful addition to the diet.

Issue: 
July, 1996
Topic: