I’m a big fan of restaurant dining. Plate it up, kitchen, and dot that sauce around the rim.
I’ve been known to plate a meal or two at my own house, for sure, but I have to admit…I’ve never served myself up a flower salad. That always seemed a little too, I don’t know, high-brow? Or maybe I was just afraid I’d eat the wrong flower.
But this year’s nasturtium crop in my garden has totally exploded. Every day I go out and there are at least two or three more blossoms and probably a dozen or 20 new leaves. It’s craziness.
So I took my commenters’ advice, and came home and fixed myself a salad tonight. Ingredients: lettuce and a variety of other greens, just cut from the garden; a few stuffed grape leaves from the local Co-op; some crumbly Mexican cheese; nasturtium leaves and a single, lovely orange nasturtium. I topped it with a blackberry-ginger-sage balsamic vinaigrette (Have no fear…that recipe’s coming soon…) and served it up with a side of red wine.
Flower salad, direct from my back yard to my stomach. And it’s so much less hassle than making a reservation. I’m going to have to do that again soon, before the nasturtiums give it up for the season.
That sounds very yummy.
Enjoy.
Hooray, Genie! I love the little peppery bite from nasturtiums, and the blossoms are so beautiful. Your salad with blackberry vinaigrette sounds perfect.
It does seem a little high brow! ;) I bet it was absolutely delicious.
Yum!!! At my house the guys would just pick out the flowers and think I was crazy. Good idea, although I always forget. All those johnny-jump-ups that sprout freely around the yard may find a nice home in my sala bowl next spring. I hear they are peppery.
–Robin (Bumblebee)
Chigiy, it was quite tasty!
Lydia, you were my inspiration! I have to admit, I felt a little silly clipping the nasturtium leaves, but they were beautiful in the salad! Now I know…and will use them much more often.
Me, it was delicious…made me feel all hoity-toity in my own house.
Robin, ooh, I didn’t know you could eat the Johnny-Jump-Ups, too. Cool!
how cool for you. looks very good. reminded me of a time that we were to decorate a student as Rudolph at my school, so being the horticulture guy, we but some tree branches on the top of a student’s head and put a nasturtium (growing in the greenhouse) on his nose. figured he could eat it if he got hungry. and not be poisoned.
edible flower of this summer were tiny marigolds that had a citrus flavor.
Genie, you can eat Johnnie Jump Ups and any other kind of Viola … even Pansies. And you know those native orange daylillies that grow all over the sides of the roads in Pennsylvania? Yummy. Very yummy.
Wayne, I like it! How’d you affix the nasturtium? Sounds like that’s much more precarious than, say, the clown’s nose version of the Rudolph get-up.
AB, really? The daylilies? Really?
It’s definitely a very pretty salad – and so late in the season!
Katiez, yeah — it does seem awfully late to still be yanking flowers out of the garden…but I’ll take it!
Oh, yeah. Too bad you’re not coming to Bethlehem in June. I’d force you to eat one just for kicks. They are also a bit peppery, but not so much so as the nasturtiums.
AB, you never know…I may very well get there in June, in which case I will make the demand for flower salad!
I was trying to remember the same thing when I wrote the post. I do remember that it was precarious and that we did not win the contest… next time super glue!!!!
Wayne, you’re too funny. Yes — Super Glue will do the trick every time!