7 edible flower options and how to serve them | Gardening 101 | Gardening Australia

Hannah Moloney taste-tests the colourful range of edible flowers in her garden. Subscribe 🔔 http://ab.co/GA-subscribe

Hannah is growing a productive garden full of not just fruit and vegetables, but also lots of flowers that are beneficial for pollinators, beauty, and add variety to her plate.

Not all flowers are edible or taste great, but the right ones are a delicious addition to the patch. It’s important to harvest them first thing in the morning during hot weather, before they dry out from heat stress, or just before you eat them as they don’t stay fresh for long.

Here are some taste-tested flowers you can easily grow at home:

The Heartsease pansy can be picked as a whole flower and popped into a salad or into ice cubes for fancy drinks. The flavour resembles a faint musk.

Rocket flowers have a similar peppery flavour to the leaves. A silver lining if your rocket bolts too soon!

Calendula flowers have a tough base so remove the petals and add them to salads or desserts.

The dainty blue flowers of borage have a faint taste of watermelon. Borage can become a prolific weed, so removing flowers to eat before they set seed also helps to keep them controlled.

Pea flowers are sweet, just like a young pea. You can also eat young leaves and tendrils. Just don’t confuse them with the ornamental Sweet Peas that are toxic to eat.

Nasturtium flowers have a strong spicy taste, with a sweet treat of nectar you can sip out of the base.

Salvia flowers also have a sweet nectar treat to sip on while gardening, but the flowers are not very tasty!

Featured Plants:
HEARTSEASE – Viola tricolor cv.
ROCKET – Eruca vesicaria cv.
CALENDULA – Calendula officinalis
BORAGE – Borago officinalis
(Check before planting: this may be an environmental weed in your area)
PEA ‘SUGAR SNAP’ – Lathyrus oleraceus cv.
NASTURTIUM – Tropaeolum majus
(Check before planting: this may be an environmental weed in your area)
AUTUMN SAGE – Salvia greggii

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