034: Edible Flowers. Mulch vs Disease.

Clipping off the flower heads on your basil plants to send the energy back to the plant to produce more green leaves? Good idea! Are you tossing out those cut flower heads of the basil? Bad idea. How about serving them as a garnish in a salad or soup? For that matter, why not start serving many of the flowers you might have in your garden on the dinner table? Today, vegetable expert and Master Gardener Gail Pothour talks about all the edible flowers that you may not have thought about munching on: borage, calendulas, citrus flowers, lavender, nasturtium, apple flowers, rose petals, and even using zucchini or daylily flowers for stuffing! And we tell you the flowers to avoid, as well.

College horticulture professor Debbie Flower explains how to thwart bringing home any soil diseases that you might have in that pile of mulch or compost. It’s Episode 34 of Garden Basics with Farmer Fred, and we will do it all in under 30 minutes.

Links:
Growing Edible Flowers in Your Garden (GN 155) Sacramento Co. Coopertive Extension
Colorado State University Extension “Edible Flowers”
"The Edible Flower Garden", by Rosalind Creasy.

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Transcript

Farmer Fred : 0:03

Welcome to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. If you're just a beginning gardener or you want good gardening information well you've come to the right spot.

Farmer Fred : 0:15

Are you clipping off the flower heads on your basil plants to send the energy back to the plant to produce more green leaves? That's a good idea. But are you tossing out those cut flower heads of the bazel? That's a bad idea. How about serving them as a garnish in a salad or a soup? For that matter, why not start serving many of the flowers you might have in your garden on your dinner table today? vegetable expert and Master Gardener Gail Pothour talks about all the edible flowers that you may not have thought about munching on: borage, calendula,s citrus flowers, lavender, nasturtium, Apple flowers, rose petals, even using zucchini or daylily flowers for stuffing. and we'll tell you the flowers to avoid munching on as well. college horticulture professor (retired) Debbie Flower explains how to thwart bringing home any soil diseases that you might have in that pile of mulch or compost. It's Episode 34 of Garden Basics with Farmer Fred and we'll do it all in under 30 minutes. Let's go.

Farmer Fred : 1:17

We talk about food a lot on this program that you raise in your yard. We also talk about flowers, as wel,l because flowers play a very important part in your garden. They attract beneficial insects for one thing, they attract pollinators as well. They're pretty to look at, but did you know they're tasty as well and can serve as food there are a lot of edible flowers that you can be growing in your garden. We're talking with vegetable expert and Master Gardener Gail Pothour. and Gai,l How did you get interested in figuring out which flowers in your garden are edible?

Gail Pothour : 1:53

Well, actually, I think it was in 2012. We had an advanced Master Gardener training on edible landscaping and I was really interested in the vegetable edible flower portion of that training. We ended up giving some workshops and so that was the portion that I spoke on. And so I've gotten interested in the flowers. I mean, I grow a lot of flowers mostly to attract beneficials but it really hadn't occurred to me that you can eat them. And so I got interested in them as a result of that workshop.

Farmer Fred : 2:25

I just went out before our conversation here I went out to the yard and thought I would sample three flowers of plants you don't think as being edible. I had a salvia, (a sage), I cut the flower off of that. I found a flower on a scented geranium that I brought in and I brought in a flower from a zinnia. And of the three, the salvia tasted the best. It had a very minty aroma. And I could see where using the flowers of herbs, especially those that maybe you cut off in order to keep the plant from bolting, could actually be used. soups and salads I'm thinking of people who have basil and they religiously go out and they snip off the flower heads off the basil to keep the green leaves producing but don't throw away those flowers because they can be very tasty, right?

Gail Pothour : 3:13

herb flowers are actually some of the easiest edible flowers that you can use. And probably most people have them growing in their garden or landscape already. You know, we have Rosemary growing around as a shrub and if you have an herb garden, you might grow chives or thyme. savory. I like cilantro and lemon verbena, mint, a lot of mints. And if you can eat the leaves of culinary herbs, you can also eat the flowers and they tend to have maybe a little more subtle flavor than the leaf. I love pineapple sage, very, very pineapply.

Farmer Fred : 3:53

I would I would think that a lot of these flowers are best to use as as a garnish, not as a main treat.

Gail Pothour : 4:01

Yeah, a lot of them you would use as a garnish, or in a salad, fresh salad. So rather than cook with it, you could use it fresh chopped up in the salad. I like to use the basil and some of my herb flowers in a green salad. I get that herb flavor without it being overpowering. But then there's also some recipes that you can use in like a marinade for fish or that sort of thing. I saw one the other day a rosemary and the sprig and the flowers in a marinade for salmon, I think it was so you can also cook with them but I think fresh application often is a little better.

Farmer Fred : 4:42

Another flowering herb that is very popular not only for the green part of the herb but also for the flower is borage and they're easy to grow. And those little star shaped flowers have what kind of a cucumber flavor.

Gail Pothour : 4:56

right and you eat the flower petals. So kind of a real pretty blue flower and you take the petals off and eat those. The leaves are real funny. And so that tends to bother me to eat something healthy like that they eat the pedal and actually on probably almost all edible flowers you would use the pedals you don't use the stamens and, and all the reproductive parts that are in the middle of the flower. You take those out. Some people have an allergy to pollen. So you just want to eliminate those. just eat the petals.

Farmer Fred : 5:31

Another popular plant that you don't think of as having edible petals are sunflowers.

Gail Pothour : 5:37

Oh, I tasted one this morning. I went out and wanted to sample the sunflower. I'm going and it had kind of a piney, I guess that's the best way to describe it, kind of a pine flavor, similar to rosemary. Not as strong, but it was reminiscent of rosemary was kind of interesting.

Farmer Fred : 5:54

Eating flowers. It goes back for centuries, doesn't it?

Gail Pothour : 5:57

Oh absolutely. It was really cool. Common in medieval Europe, and they often used food back then as medicine. So a lot of the things that that we grow today, mostly for ornamental, which were used for medicinal purposes back a long time ago.

Farmer Fred : 6:13

I would think then that basically any flower that isn't poisonous or doesn't cause a negative reaction would be considered edible. But how the heck do you determine what's poisonous and what's edible before you eat it?

Gail Pothour : 6:27

Well, find a list. I originally started using a book written by Rosalind Creasy. It's called the Edible Flower Garden. She has a whole series of edible books. And she had a great list in there of plants that are toxic and ones that are, you know, commonly eaten, and also, Colorado State University Extension, put out quite a lengthy list of edible flowers and a list of toxic flowers. I think Rosalind Creasy has Good advice when she stated in her book. If the plant is not on any list of edible plants, or on any list of poisonous plants, assume it's not edible. We wouldn't recommend just going out and kind of grazing through your garden because not all flowers are edible.

Farmer Fred : 7:20

We'll have links in the show notes for this episode of garden basics for Colorado state's University's list of edibles as well as a link to Roz Creasy's book on edible flower gardening. And we'll have a link to to the publication you put out through the University of California ag and natural resources, the Cooperative Extension in Sacramento County, called "growing edible flowers in your garden'". So we'll have that list available on the show notes as well for people to check out. I guess the first rule would be Be sure to positively identify any flower before eating it just because there are some look alikes out there that may not be what you think they are.

Gail Pothour : 7:58

right. proper identification is critical and use the scientific name because many plants have similar common names. So, I would always recommend finding the scientific name for the flower or the plant. And only eating those common names can be very confusing.

Farmer Fred : 8:18

Obviously, do not eat any flowers that if you have asthma, allergies, or hay fever, and you also bring up in your garden notes there about growing edible flowers in your garden, a very important point to only eat flowers that have been grown organically because of pesticide residues.

Gail Pothour : 8:37

Right now, that's why it's not recommended that you use flowers that you get from a florist or even maybe a nursery because you don't know exactly how they were grown and they're usually not grown for consumption, you know, not the flowers. So pretty much need to grow them yourself. Or sometimes I noticed farmers markets, at least in The past, have had maybe a booth here or there where they were selling edible flowers. I don't know how common it is today. But I just recommend growing them yourself. Because you know exactly what's been put on them and how they've been grown. That's my recommendation.

Farmer Fred : 9:16

That's good advice. When is the best time of day to collect flowers and how do you choose a flower? As far as quality?

Gail Pothour : 9:24

Yeah, yeah, usually it's best to get them in the morning. Maybe not too early. You don't want dew on them, but you want to pick them before the heat of the day starts. So they're usually pretty fragile. So carry them in a little box and refrigerate them, use them as quickly as you can. They tend to not last very long. You don't want flowers that are on their way out, you know, starting to wilt and then you want ones that have opened up except I think day lilies are a little different. Often you'll use the bud of the daylily. You can chop those up for stir fries and whatnot. But most other flowers you want them already to be opening up before you pick them.

Farmer Fred : 10:05

Now you brought up a very interesting topic because there are some rather large flowers out there that make for excellent receptacles for stuffing and then eating the whole thing. Day lilies for one, are very popular. I know that's a popular thing on the menu up at a local nursery up in Amador county called Amador flower farm, which is a daylily grower.

Gail Pothour : 10:28

I know, I've had them up there. We had a Master Gardener field trip there many years ago. And they served them because they specialize in daily life. They served day lilies that were stuffed with an herb cream cheese mixture and another one served with chocolate mousse. It was my first introduction to eating flowers. It was it was terrific.

Farmer Fred : 10:50

Another large flower that you can stuff that people may have in their yard right now are zucchini flowers, right?

Gail Pothour : 10:56

You can eat squash flowers, zucchini They're the preferred one to eat because they tend to be a little bit larger than other squash flowers. And again with the squash, I would recommend taking the reproductive parts out, the stamens and the pistils and all that because that's where you're going to have pollen and other things in there. Sometimes you'll find little critters in there like bees, squash bees, often squash bees will spend the night inside the squash flower so just be sure when you pick it that there's no critters inside and take the reproductive parts out and stuff it with ricotta and batter it and fry it.

Farmer Fred : 11:37

I would think also that if you still want zucchini in the garden, choose only the male flowers and leave the female flowers intact.

Gail Pothour : 11:46

Correct. The male flowers are the ones that just have a long stem; the female flowers will have an immature fruit at the base of the ovary. And although I have seen in restaurants where they take the Little tiny female flowers you know with the with the tiny little vegetable at the end and they've cooked the whole thing they've stuffed the flowers and then left the tiny zucchini attached. Yeah, that's something I have yet to try that it's kind of intriguing.

Farmer Fred : 12:17

2 of my favorite flowers to use and, and in any garden book they'll recommend that you always cut them off when you see them, are onion flowers and garlic flowers. and the reason for cutting them off is you want to put the energy into forming a bigger bulb, not in forming reproductive structures. And so those flowers and and the seeds that might be associated with that flower head very tasty.

Gail Pothour : 12:43

they are and something that would be a little bit easier but kind of have the same flavor would be regular onion chives or garlic chives. My garlic chives are just starting to bloom and they have a subtle garlic flavor and I read an article the The other day that society garlic is edible. And the reason it was called society garlic is it was a little less garlicky on your breath so that when you ate it, and you were out in public, you were a little more social, apparently.

Farmer Fred : 13:18

And of course, you've mentioned already that when you're out picking flowers, you don't want the blemished blossoms you want quality flowers, so to speak, you want to clean off any dirt or insects. should they be stored in the refrigerator and in what sort of container in a refrigerator,

Gail Pothour : 13:34

kind of a flat container maybe with slightly damp and paper towels just to keep them from wilting, but you should really use them pretty quickly. They're not generally wouldn't last too long in the refrigerator. And I do want to mention though, if you're going to start eating some edible flowers that you have never eaten before, you might want to start eating them a little At a time just to find out if you have any kind of reaction to them. Some people have allergic reactions and you just won't know until you eat them and to eat them in small quantities at first.

Farmer Fred : 14:12

So after you've picked these flowers for consumption later in the day, do you wash them first? Or do you do you wash them as the last step before serving?

Gail Pothour : 14:21

You know, I've read articles about saying both. Some say you can wash them, when you're asked to pick them and then store them or wash them right before you use them. I would tend to give them a brief little brush off and maybe with a damp paper towel or something before I stored them in the refrigerator. To me, that seems the better way to go.

Farmer Fred : 14:44

We haven't even we've been talking about annuals and the flowers that are grown on those sometimes edible crops as well as flowering plants. But there are perennials, trees and shrub flowers, too, that are quite edible. What are some of your favorites in those categories?

Gail Pothour : 14:59

citrus I have a mandarin tree, a couple of them. I have a lemon, I have a lime and those flowers are definitely edible. The lime is a little more astringent maybe than an orange blossom would be but you can certainly use citrus flowers.

Farmer Fred : 15:17

I was reading somewhere that ancient civilizations used to eat rose petals.

Gail Pothour : 15:23

Yes, roses are edible. You might not want to eat every row. Some of them have a better flavor than others. And actually, I can say that about most, most flowers. Just because you can eat them doesn't mean you should they may not have great flavor. So some rose petals would taste better than others. And when you take the pedal off, there's kind of a little white area where it was attached to the plant. I don't know exactly what that scientific name is. But kind of cut that off because that can be bitter.

Farmer Fred : 15:55

I noticed that among the spring flowering fruit trees Apple have very nice tasty flower as well. Right? I've never tried apple blossoms, but I have heard that they're very tasty and kind of a sweet flavor. So there's actually a number of trees that have flowers that are edible plum, I may go try my pluot tree next year when it flowers to see how those days we should reinforce the point to that. Check out these lists of edible plants and make sure that the plant that you are about to taste, a) you've identified it; and b), it's on one of those lists of edible flowers from plants because there are some flowers to avoid and you have a rather extensive list there on your handout of growing edible flowers in your garden which again, we will link to in the show notes. What are some of the probably the more common ones that people might be tempted to eat that they shouldn't be eating?

Unknown Speaker : 16:50

Well, I would think maybe Azalea is the idea is commonly grown in many areas of the country and all parts of that plant are toxic. daffodils, foxgloves. I know they make digitalis for heart medication from Foxglove. So you wouldn't want to eat that. hydrangeas. A lot of people grow hydrangeas and hydrangea all all portions of the hydrangea plants are toxic. So are oleander, poinsettia. Sweet peas. Now this is the sweet pea vine that you grow ornamentally you can eat the flowers of garden peas that they're very tasty so you don't want to confuse those. But the sweet pea the ornamental is toxic,

Farmer Fred : 17:33

and I'm really fond of some cover crops and their flowers like fava beans, just an excellent flavor.

Gail Pothour : 17:39

Yeah, they're they're very tasty and crimson clover is also used as a cover crop over the winter and those flowers are edible as well.

Farmer Fred : 17:49

Alright, and some of the bulbs that you may have in your garden probably are on the avoid list. Things like irises and tulips. And daffodils

Gail Pothour : 18:01

Lily of the Valley. Yes. Yeah I needed to say if it's not on a list of something that you can eat, I would not try it exactly at first.

Farmer Fred : 18:11

anything you want to add to this?

Gail Pothour : 18:13

Well only that there's really a lot of uses for edible flowers. I mean I think of them use fresh as a garnish or in a salad that's basically how I use them. But you can also sprinkle them on pizza and pasta. I'm actually going to be making pasta in the next couple of days and I'm going to sprinkle it with basil flowers actually hadn't occurred to me to do that you can make butters; nasturtiums or chives are great. chop them up in butters. You know and you can spread it on a main dish. You can spread it on bread. So there's a lot of uses. You can candy them. You can put fresh flowers on cupcakes and you can eat them and dessert, of course lavender ice cream, things like that. So there's a lot of uses for flowering. things we don't generally think of.

Farmer Fred : 19:02

And again, I was just checking out that Colorado State University Extension list of edible flowers, which has the unromantic name of edible flowers 7.237. Go figure that. But we'll have a link on that one for you too, because it's a very extensive list and there's one on there that I just might go out and try real quick. It's the Agastache, which is a very attractive plant for hummingbirds. I think the common name for agastache is anise hyssop.

Gail Pothour : 19:38

So it would have kind of a licorice flavor.

Farmer Fred : 19:41

That's it says here. Yes, sort of a sweet licorice. Strong anise flavor. So Agastache? Yeah, try that one. And even tuberous begonias.

Gail Pothour : 19:51

The flowers surprise to me and on our list the one the Master Gardener lists where we have the tuberous begonia listed edible flowers the tuberous begonia is listed as being edible. But there's a note there that says only hybrid varieties are edible. So you have to determine if the variety you are trying to eat is a hybrid or not.

Farmer Fred : 20:13

many people can grow this one: nasturtiums

Gail Pothour : 20:15

Oh, nasturtiums? Yeah, it's kind of a peppery flavor similar to watercress, sort of. And not only is the flower edible of nasturtiums, but the leaves are and also the seed. When they start to develop seeds. You can use those and pickle them sort of like a caper. But yeah, it's a real peppery kind of flavor. Plus the flowers are so pretty from white to orange, yellow and red, that if you had that as a garnish are chopped up in a salad or even sprinkled in something like a rice dish at the end so it was more of a garnish on your rice dish, it would be very attractive and it would taste good, as well.

Farmer Fred : 20:52

So folks, you have more food in your garden than you even dreamed of. Take advantage of the flowers that are out there. Just be sure That those flowers are on some lists that say they are edible. And also commit to memory those that are not edible. You don't want to be eating those.

Gail Pothour : 21:10

There are other vegetable flowers that you're probably growing in your garden that you can eat. Aside from just squash. I mentioned garden peas earlier but kale. In fact, I was munching on my kale flowers this last year, and they're quite tasty. And broccoli. Broccoli actually is the flower head. And when they start to open up these little yellow flowers, you can eat those. You won't find those flowering in a grocery store or a farmer's market. You'd need to grow them yourself in order to have broccoli flowers.

Farmer Fred : 21:44

Well, you bring up another good point with that. And for those of us who are blessed to live in a climate where you can grow cool season crops that mature during the fall and winter, but as soon as the weather starts warming up, they bolt they send out flower stocks like before Broccoli, for example, or cilantro. the flowers that remain are very attractive for beneficial insects. But they're tasty too. Right?

Gail Pothour : 22:08

So if you are growing radishes and they've bolted in gone to flower that will attract beneficial insects but they're also edible and you get a little bit of that radish flavors a little more subtle than the radish itself. So, yeah, it's there's quite a number of cool season crops in brassica family that when they flower, they attract beneficials and you can eat them as well.

Farmer Fred : 22:30

So again, we'll have links in the show notes to growing edible flowers in your garden. The garden notes it's GN 155, produced by the Cooperative Extension in Sacramento County. There is the list from Colorado State University, Colorado State list of edibles, as well as a link to a Roz Creasy's book, "the edible flower garden" and she's written a series of books about edibles.

Gail Pothour : 22:54

And in her book, she also has in the last half of the book. She has a bunch of recipes So it gives you some ideas what to do with all those flowers.

Farmer Fred : 23:03

There you go. Gail Pothour we learned a lot. I'm getting hungry, it's time to go eat.

Gail Pothour : 23:08

Thanks, Fred.

Farmer Fred : 23:15

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Farmer Fred : 24:11

Here at the Garden Basics we like to answer your questions, because I can just toss them off to our favorite (retired) college horticultural Professor, Debbie Flower. And Debbie, questions have been coming in people worried about compost and mulch, as far as can they spread disease if they spread that compost or mulch on their garden?

Debbie Flower : 24:31

Oh, you always give me the hard ones. Fred, you make me work. I know.

Farmer Fred : 24:34

I need more time to ride a bike.

Debbie Flower : 24:41

The short answer is yes, they can be spread. Diseases, pathogens or infectious diseases can be spread by bringing mulch or compost into your yard that contains the mulch or compost contains those infectious pathogens. The other short answer is that typically it's not going to happen. The conditions needed for that pathogen and I'm thinking primarily a fungal pathogens like Fusarium wilt, let's say the conditions needed for that pathogen to move from the compost or mulch into the soil into the plant, in most cases do not exist. Somewhere along the process, that pathogen will die. But there are some ways you know, you don't if you have a really beautiful tree that is susceptible to fusarium, you really don't want to chance killing it or infecting it with with a fungal pathogen. So even you know if the chances is one and 100 or whatever. So there are some things that you can do to limit or take the chance of that happening down to to zero and one is to let the mulch or compost dry out. then The pathogen will die. and or let it sit and compost and get hot. And I have brought in many loads of mulch from arborist tree chippings from arborists' work had been deposited on my property and if you let them sit a few days, you can see the steam rising out of the top of that pile tends to be a great compost mix. We talked about carbon and nitrogen ratios for compost, and that chopping down a tree that has green leaves on it tends to be the perfect mix of carbon and nitrogen for a compost pile. So I just leave it there and let it compost for a while and that will kill that hotness will kill the pathogens in the in the pile. That makes me feel better than even if I'm bringing in something that potentially has a disease in it. That disease has been killed by that process. Finally chopping or grinding the material, letting it sit for three days or longer in a pile so that it heats up. And if you really wanted to take it to the nth degree, have it have your mulch or compost on a hard surface, not on soil, where it can actually pick up more diseases and keep it covered so that more diseases can't enter it from the top. But there is very little, if any evidence that diseases are being passed from mulch, or compost to live plants in the garden. Yes, they can be carried in that material. But between the complicated process to get from the material to the plant, and the handling of the material, the fact that it's chopped, the fact that it's allowed to sit and heat up all lead to very ineffective infestation of the plant. So basically, the answer is no it doesn't have to.

Farmer Fred : 27:54

Yeah you mentioned fusarium wilt and another concern would be verticillium wilt which affects hundreds of plants, including your tomato garden, and I believe in conversations we've had about this before, if you just leave the mulch on the surface and don't mix it into the soil, you lessen the chance of anything happening, right?

Debbie Flower : 28:15

Because then that fungus, which is not, doesn't have legs, in order for the fungus to get to the plant, it has to get to the soil, and then it has to travel through the soil to the plant. So the plant is there. And again, it doesn't have that kind of brain, it doesn't look out and say, oh, there's something like an insect over there. Infection normally occurs when the two meet each other by meeting like the root of the plant and the soil borne disease meet each other in the soil. So that then infection would occur. So just leaving it on top, that's not going to happen. So you're right. Don't mix it in.

Farmer Fred : 28:42

So what we've learned today is funguses don't have legs and they don't have a brain. Very important to know that yes?

Debbie Flower : 28:57

yes, that's right.

Farmer Fred : 29:00

There you go as long as you let that pile sit as long as you don't incorporate it into the soil and right from the get go You should be okay, right? Debbie Flower, as always we learned something new thanks so much.

Debbie Flower : 29:14

My pleasure Fred thank you.

Farmer Fred : 29:18

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