Are you eating your garden?

Some time ago I wrote a piece about my new social front garden and how, in the summer, it became a focus for cups of tea with neighbours, and chats with passing strangers. Now I’m hoping the interest will increase, since I’ve planted some fruit trees – a line of columnar plums, greengages and cherries (minarettes and duo-minarettes from the Ken Muir mail-order nursery) alongside my decked path, leading up to a standard cherry “Merton’s Glory” on the dwarfing rootstock “Gisela” from the same supplier. In between the trees, I’ve planted Blueberry and Bilberry bushes in large meshed bags which are buried in the ground and filled with a mix of soil & ericaceous compost. The intention of this is to provide the berry bushes with the acid conditions they enjoy, whilst keeping the soil around the trees a more neutral pH. As this is my front garden, I’m hoping not to resort to netting to protect the fruit from birds – I’m quite happy to share some of the produce with them, but I’d like some reward for myself too. We already have an Amelanchier tree in this garden which produces edible berries as well as being very decorative – though I’ve never yet managed to beat the blackbirds to the crop!
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Eating flowers ...

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Many ornamental plants are also edible.

Obvious things are the culinary herbs – we grow various species of Thyme and Oregano in our Purbeck stone planter wall (these will also grow readily in rocky crevices or gaps in paving, etc), Rosemary in small bush form (keeping it compact and fresh by clipping back after spring / early summer flowering), Sage in several colours, Bronze Fennel in the very dry places, Chives in moister places and Apple Mint (in a pot to stop it being invasive).

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Less obviously we grow Borage - the leaves can be used like spinach and the very pretty cucumber-tasting flowers used in salads or to decorate desserts or drinks; the peppery leaves and flower petals of Nasturtiums (cleaned of aphids!) are great in salads or sandwiches where I use them in place of watercress. Rocket is a very common ingredient now in “gourmet” salads. Daylillies - Hemerocallis, NOT Lillium species which are poisonous - can be deep fried, or used in desserts; Lavender flowers are also sweet & fragrant in savoury dishes & baking.

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Most of these aromatic plants are also nectar-rich, providing a food source for bees as well as ourselves, so doing a valuable job for the environment generally, as discussed in my earlier blog posts here and here .

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Do please be careful – some flowers are poisonous or can affect allergy sufferers – for more information see these recipe sites:

http://whatscookingamerica.net/EdibleFlowers/EdibleFlowersMain.htm http://www.recipes4us.co.uk/Edible%20Flowers.htm and http://homecooking.about.com/library/weekly/blflowers.htm or just Google “edible flowers”.
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Sustainable gardens ...

Sustainable gardens expert, Mark Laurence has some great ideas on urban living and sustainability that he calls “whole systems” thinking - including green roofs which I've previously blogged about - and green walling. What I find most interesting are his ideas for growing foods – the edible landscape - where most of the plants in a design can be used as edible crops.

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Mine is a small garden, and the potential for expansive cropping is limited, but if you have a larger space available, an article in the Telegraph by Bunny Guinness explains about forest gardens, first pioneered by Robert A de J Hart in the sixties.

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The edible playground garden, which won an award at Chelsea in 2008 was created to encourage schools to build their own vegetable garden. There’s more information on edible school gardens here.

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Encouragement from the top?

Even the American president is “on message” - growing crops at the White House !

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Lastly, I can’t leave this topic without a mention of my Twitter friend, Tracey, whose blog Norfolkkitchen provides amusing stories & fabulous recipes for food using ingredients from her garden and foraged from the local environment. Happy eating in 2010!

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Disclaimer: The author, Steve Rice, has thoroughly researched all the plants (leaves or flowers) mentioned in this article as edible. However, individuals consuming the flowers, plants, or any derivatives do so entirely at their own risk and the author cannot be held responsible for any adverse reactions.

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