Lace leafed Elderflower

This year we’ve had an unusual amount of rain, which is heavenly after the years of intense heat and drought we’ve had recently.

The plants are ecstatic, growing rampant, rioting all over the yard. Early in the morning, I stand in the still humid air and breathe deeply, reveling in the moisture coating my nose and lungs, the perfume of honeysuckles and roses, and the songs of birds waking in the trees. The roses are producing enormous flowers, and they are especially beautiful when raindrops dot the leaves. If I look to the west, I see my elderberry plants, which have grown huge and are so covered with umbel flowers that I can barely see any leaves. Their fragrance is ambrosial. I have one elderberry bush, a red lace leaf elderberry, that I use mostly for the flowers, as the berries are small and thus hard to process. The other bushes produce bigger berries which get harvested and used for wine, syrups, or elixirs. The lace leaf has thousands of delicate pink flowers, and I harvest many of those, careful to leave some for the pollinators who love them as much as I do.

Flowers, admired for their beauty and aroma, are a much neglected food.

Many are delicious. Think of nasturtiums, with their delectable flowers and spicy leaves; the blossoms make a salad sparkle and shine, and the buds can be made into a pickled food very similar to capers. Or violets. I think of violets in salads, both flowers and leaves, violets on top of a cake topped with whipped cream, Flavigny violet candies that I used to get as a treat when I was a little girl attending the ballet with my parents, sugared violets, and violet liqueurs. Fuschias are also edible, an exotic and elegant addition to a salad. How about chamomile? We tend to think of it as an herb, since it is used in tea, but it’s actually a tiny delicate flower. Calendulas, the happiest of flowers, can be used in salads too – I like to scatter some petals on top to warm up the colors. And saffron! In that case we only use the stigma of the flower, but it is precious. Rose petals can be used to make cremes and sorbets and elixirs and teas, and we feed some petals to our rabbit as a treat. The chickens like roses too, devouring every flower that pokes through their fencing. But have you ever considered cooking with elderflowers?

I fill sacks with them and bring them into my kitchen for processing. This year there are so many that I had to immediately put some in the dryer racks for dehydration. If I don’t deal with them quickly, if I leave them too long in their sacks, they will soon get moldy, and that’s a terrible waste.

They fill the house with their scent as I work. I will use the dried flowers in teas, mixed with nettles, yarrow, tulsi basil, lemon balm, and a few other fever fighting herbs. I keep them in a jar or three in the basement, so that I can mix them with other ingredients whenever I like, and in whatever combination I like. But they are so fragrant and delicious, I want to use some of them fresh.

Luckily there are many ways to do that!

Making Elderflower Sorbet

One of my new favorite recipes is elderflower sorbet.

It requires only four ingredients: elderflowers, lemon peel and juice, sugar and water. To make it, take about twenty heads (umbels) of elderflowers and snip off as many of the little stems as you can. Put these in a pot with the zest and juice of two lemons, a half cup sugar, and 500 ml water. Bring this to a simmer, and remove from the heat right away. Let this sit somewhere, covered, for 2-4 hours. Filter the contents of the pot through a sieve and freeze in a covered container. After about three hours, when it’s starting to freeze up, put it in the food processor and puree it. It will get a bit fluffier. Freeze again. After a couple more hours, do the same thing. I find that pureeing two times suffices. This may be the most delicious sorbet I’ve ever had. My friend Rachel sat at my dining table in a trance as she sampled it, her eyes glazing over as she stared out the window. She looked stunned, and then she recovered, said, “wow!”, and demanded the recipe.

The divine sorbet

But there are other things one can do. I recently made a liqueur, which is still steeping. I filled a quart jar about halfway up with elderflowers, added some lemon peel and juice (one lemon), and a quarter cup of sugar. Then I poured vodka almost to the top of the jar. I keep it covered and shake it up at least once a day to make sure that no mold grows on any exposed flowers. It smells divine. I’m thinking that I might like to try making a liqueur (or another sorbet!) with elderflowers and roses. For that I’ll probably use less lemon, just a tad, as it does seem to bring out the flavor of the elderflowers.

One can also make an elderflower simple syrup by steeping elderflowers with some lemon zest in hot sugar water (equal parts sugar and water heated until the sugar is dissolved). This syrup can be used in drinks with fizzy water, or it can be used in frosting on cakes. It won’t last forever (though it will last longer if there’s a bit of alcohol added – still, it’s nice to make a non-alcoholic drink), so use it within a month or so. I’m imagining elderflower cupcakes with elderflower simple syrup in the frosting and a few flowers sprinkled on top, or a light elderflower cake with whipped cream and elderflowers sprinkled on it. The simple syrup would be delightful in a drink with gin – try some gin with the syrup and fizzy water, over ice, with a sprig of mint or a few elderflowers sprinkled in. The possibilities could be endless!

A simple tincture might also be a good thing. Just fill a jar half way with elderflowers and cover with vodka. Shake it daily and let it steep for at least a month. Make sure you label it! Too often I’ve forgotten to label tincture jars, and then I’ve been clueless as to how long they’ve been steeping. It’s not the end of the world when that happens, but it IS a bit inconvenient.

I hope I don’t  sound like a fanatic. I’m feeling a great need for flowers in my life, with their exquisite forms and colors and heady perfumes. Perhaps in light (or more appropriately dark) of current world events – the war in the Ukraine, shootings in schools, environmental degradation, and constant news of record setting heat – a little beauty is wanted. I walk through my garden and smell a rose, and it seems to be telling me something. “I’m here, now, enjoy my perfume. There is still loveliness in this world!” I look at a fuchsia and am reminded that there’s more to the kitchen garden than rows of potatoes and squash. The roses by my back porch, luminous pink and yellow, offer a whole world if one approaches and peers deep inside the opening blossom. When I enter my yard through the honeysuckle covered archway, the flowers shower me with their fragrance, like a cascade of devotion and enchantment. It feels like a gift. The plants ask me to stop, stand still, breathe in. I may not get a lot of peppers this year, but there is a world of magic surrounding me. It’s worth bringing into the kitchen.