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Crystallised Rose Petals

Crystallised rose petals
Roses

Crystallised Rose Petals

It is early summer, the roses are blooming and it is time to make Crystallised Rose Petals!  I love using edible flowers in my cooking and roses are one of my favourites as they smell wonderful and come in some many fantastic colours –  ruby red, crimson, shell pink, soft yellow, pure white…. There is something very romantic and decadent about strewing rose petals over your home-made cake or dessert!

These sugary petals are really easy to make providing you have access to flowers that you know have not been treated with any chemicals.  If you have roses in your garden, or have a kind friend or neighbour who does, you are all set!  Don’t use roses that are sold as cut flowers as they probably will have been chemically treated.

You can crystallise any kind of edible flower.  It has the effect of both preserving the petals – if you don’t do this, they wilt very quickly – and also making them taste sweet and sugary!

It is very easy to make Crystallised Rose petals, in fact it is a great activity to do with children. However,  if you are planning on using them to decorate a cake or pudding, you do need to make them the day before to allow them time to dry.

Crystallised rose petals
Rose petals
Equipment:

Pastry brush, cake rack

Crystallised flowers
Crystallised Rose Petals
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Crystallised flowers

Crystallised Rose Petals

  • Author: Tastebotanical
  • Prep Time: 10
  • Total Time: 10 minutes
  • Category: Baking ingredients
  • Cuisine: English
Print Recipe

Description

Sugary Crystallised Rose Petals look beautiful as a decoration on cakes and puddings and add a delicious rose flavour.

 

Ingredients

Scale
  • Petals from 3–4 roses
  • 1 egg white
  • Caster sugar

Instructions

  1. Wash the rose petals and dry gently using kitchen paper.
  2. Paint each petal with egg white and then dip it into the caster sugar.
  3. Place on the cake rack to dry and harden.  This will take about 24 hours.
  4. Use to decorate cakes or puddings.

Notes

Make sure that you use rose petals that have not been treated with any chemicals.  The best place is from your garden as you will know what has been used on the roses.   Don’t use shop-bought roses unless they are specifically designated as being for culinary use.

The flavour will be better if you use strongly scented roses.

Keywords: crystallised rose petals

Crystallised rose petals
Rose petals

 

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Strawberry and Rose Geranium Jam

Strawberry and Rose Geranium Jam

Easy-to-make Strawberry and Rose Geranium Jam has all the fruity loveliness of strawberries but with a floral boost provided by the addition of Rose Geranium leaves.    This recipe is based on one in Sarah Raven’s Food for Friends and Family which is one of my favourite cookery books.  It is really easy to make and is fantastic on crusty bread or as an ingredient in cakes and puddings.   If you don’t have access to Rose Geraniums, you can add a little rosewater to the jam to add a floral accent.

Strawberries for jam
Strawberries

I grow strawberries in my garden but they are  not yet ready for picking.  Therefore, as it is half-term this week, I took two of my adolescent children with me to Primrose Vale Pick-Your-Own farm which is about a half hour drive from where I live.  My two gaming-addicted companions were somewhat reluctant at the prospect of this outing but actually enjoyed it a lot (and picked more strawberries than they ate!).  It is a good spot for a family outing, with a playground for younger children, an excellent farm shop and a cafe serving drinks and snacks and wonderful, locally-produced  Winstones ice-cream.

Pelargonium
Rose Geranium
About Rose Geraniums

There are a number of scented varieties of Rose Geranium (which are actually technically pelargoniums) and all have leaves that smell of rose –  I think they actually smell a bit like Turkish Delight!  I have two varieties –  Angels Perfume and Attar of Roses  –  which I bought from Herbal Haven which is a specialist herb nursery.

Rose Geranium leaves can be used in lots of puddings and desserts to add a subtle rose flavour.  I think this is a better way than using rose-petals as you only need a few leaves whereas you need loads of petals (and, really, who wants to destroy their roses?).

Strawberry jam
So many strawberries!
Equipment

Heavy pan and a large sterilised jam jar (There are various ways of sterilising jars.  I think the easiest is to wash in soapy water and then put in an oven at 120 C for 15 minutes)

Ready for jam
Strawberries and Rose Geranium leaves
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Strawberry Jam

Strawberry and Rose Geranium Jam

  • Author: Tastebotanical
  • Prep Time: 15
  • Cook Time: 15
  • Total Time: 30 minutes
  • Yield: 1 jam jar 1x
  • Category: Jam
  • Cuisine: English
Print Recipe

Description

A beautiful summer jam, perfect to make when strawberries are in season in June or July, which has the added twist of a hint of rose.

Ingredients

Scale
  • 500 g fresh strawberries
  • 500 g jam sugar (caster sugar with added pectin)
  • Juice of 1 lemon
  • 4 Rose Geranium leaves (or a teaspoon of rosewater)

Instructions

  1. Wash the strawberries and hull them (remove the green leafy bit).
  2. Put the strawberries into your pan together with the lemon juice and the Rose Geranium leaves.   If you do not have access to a Rose Geranium plant, you can add a teaspoon  of rosewater if you want your jam to have a floral accent.  Otherwise you can make it without either – it will still taste really good!
  3. Heat for around 5 minutes until the strawberries have become soft and released their juice.
  4. Add the jam sugar and bring to the boil.  Then allow to continue boiling for 10 minutes until the setting point is reached.  (You can judge the setting point by putting a saucer in your freezer before making the jam.  Spoon some of the jam onto the cold saucer and leave to cool.  If the surface of the jam crinkles when you push it with your finger, it is ready.  If not, continue boiling and try again after a few more minutes).
  5. Remove from the heat and then pour into a sterilised jam jar.

Notes

You can sterilise your jam jar by washing it in soapy water and then putting it in an oven at 120 C for 15 minutes.

Keywords: strawberry jam, strawberry and rose jam, rose geranium jam

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Strawberries and Rose Geranium leaves – ready for jam!

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Lilac Cake – Lilac and Vanilla Victoria Sandwich Cake with Lilac Honey and Mascarpone Frosting

Lilac honey mascarpone
Lilac cake with mascarpone and lilac honey frosting

Lilac and Vanilla Victoria Sandwich Cake with Lilac Honey and Mascarpone Frosting

This Lilac and Vanilla Victoria Sandwich Cake is early summer on a plate!  It tastes wonderful – creamy, buttery and floral – and looks beautiful with its decoration of edible flowers.  I made my Lilac Cake for a special family tea, which thanks to recent surprisingly sunny weather, we were actually able to eat in the garden, close to the tree that had provided the blossoms.

This is a simple Victoria Sandwich cake, which is flavoured with lilac through the use of Lilac Sugar in the cake mix and Lilac Honey in the frosting.     It is really easy to make both the flavoured Sugar and Honey but you need to do this around a week before you plan to make your Lilac Cakee to allow the lilac flavour to be absorbed.   If you don’t have the time, inclination or opportunity to do this, you can make the cake without the lilac flavour – just use ordinary sugar in the cake mix and ordinary honey in the frosting.  The cake will still be delicious but, personally, I think it is worth going down the lilac route as the taste is unusual and results in a beautiful floral cake (to taste and to look at!) which captures the spirit of an early English summer.

Lilac honey for frosting
Lilac honey
Equipment

2 x 21 cm  or containers

Lilac cake
Eggs
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Lilac mascarpone and honey

Lilac and Vanilla Victoria Sandwich Cake with Lilac Honey and Mascarpone Frosting

  • Author: Tastebotanical
  • Prep Time: 60
  • Cook Time: 35
  • Total Time: 1 hour 35 minutes
  • Yield: for 10 people 1x
  • Category: Cake
  • Method: Baking
  • Cuisine: English
Print Recipe

Description

This is a fabulous Lilac Cake which celebrates the taste of English lilac.  It looks and tastes amazing and would be fantastic for an early summer birthday or special party.

Ingredients

Scale

For the cake:

  • 450 g butter (softened)
  • 450 g Lilac Sugar (or caster sugar)
  • 8 eggs
  • 450 g self-raising flour
  • 7 tablespoons of milk
  • 2 teaspoons of [amazon_link asins='B00DUF3D9C|B0046EJ570|B00DUF3D9C|B00DUF3D9C|B007TA9ONI' text='Vanilla Essence' template='ProductLink' store='tastebotanica-21success|tastebotanica-20|tastebotani0c-21success|tastebotani0a-21success|tastebotani01-21success' marketplace='UK|US|IT|FR|DE' link_id='9c5499ff-68a6-11e8-a321-8188ded5e5dd']

For the frosting:

  • 500 g mascarpone
  • 2 tbs of Lilac Honey (or ordinary honey)
  • Fresh lilac flowers from two flower heads

Instructions

Method:  Cake

  1. Set your oven to 180 degrees centigrade or Gas Mark 4.
  2. Cream the butter with the sugar.  (I usually soften the butter for about 30 seconds in the microwave first as it makes it much easier!)
  3. Gradually add the eggs to the butter and sugar mixture.  If it looks as if it is going to curdle, add some of the self-raising flour.
  4. Once the eggs have been incorporated add the rest of the self-raising flour.
  5. Add the milk and the vanilla extract.  It really makes a difference if you use a good quality vanilla extract – as opposed to vanilla essence – as this will give it a much more intense flavour.
  6. Grease your Victoria Sandwich tins or containers and then add the cake mixture.
  7. Bake your cakes in the oven for around 35 minutes.  They are done when they are golden brown, springy to the touch and have shrunk away from the edge of the tin.  You can test this by inserting a skewer in the middle of the cake – if it comes out cleanly with no mixture attached, your cake is done.
  8. Allow your cakes to cool on a rack before removing them from the tins or containers.

Method:  Frosting

  1. Beat the mascarpone and honey together in a food processor or using a hand blender until the mixture has thickened slightly.
  2. Use a third of the frosting to sandwich together your two cakes.
  3. Spread the remaining frosting over the top and sides of the assembled Lilac Cake.
  4. Take the small lilac flowers off the flower heads and wash them in cold water.   Allow to dry off on kitchen towel and then use them to decorate the top of the cake.   You need to complete this part of the decoration just before you are ready to serve the cake to ensure that the flowers look fresh and lovely!
  5. In the (unlikely) event that there is any Lilac Cake left over, this needs to be stored in the fridge due to the mascarpone icing.  It will keep for a couple of days but, like all sponge cakes, it tastes better when it is freshly made.

Notes

Make sure that the lilac you use has not been treated with chemicals.  The best place to get it is from your garden or that of a friend or neighbour.  Shop-bought lilac is not suitable for this recipe.

Keywords: lilac cake, lilac and vanilla cake

Mascarpone and lilac honey frosting
Spread the frosting on the Lilac Cake
This recipe has been shared with:
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Elderflower and Lemon Cupcakes

These Elderflower and Lemon Cupcakes are the perfect easy summer baking recipe. The sponge is light and buttery. The use of fresh lemon makes them fresh and zesty and perfectly balances the floral flavour of the elderflower. The flavour of the cakes is echoed in the buttercream which is flavoured with fresh lemon juice and elderflower cordial.

Over the past few years, elderflower has become a very popular flavouring for all kinds of cakes and desserts. I first made these Elderflower Cupcakes a number of years ago at the request of my daughter for her to share with her biology class.  Each week a member of the class brings in cakes to share – school doesn’t sound so bad nowadays – and she specifically asked me not to make cakes with an unusual flavour.  Her exact words were “don’t make the flavour too ‘out there’, mum”.    After a focused discussion, during which various flavours were discounted –  lilac? (No), Lady Grey tea? (No!),  dandelion? (Seriously?!!) – we agreed on elderflower.

Although I love elderflower and use it in desserts regularly, this was the first time I had tried it in Elderflower Cupcakes.  I am not really a big cupcake maker!  I made two batches – one with just elderflower and one with elderflower and lemon.  When I tasted them, I understood immediately why it is usual to include lemon as an additional flavouring.  The cupcakes made just with elderflower were far too sweet for my taste but those made with elderflower and lemon were just right – floral but zesty!

What you need to know about these cupcakes

  • You don’t need access to fresh elderflowers to make them. In England, elderflowers are in season in May and June and are very common in hedgerows and the edge of woodland. I use fresh elderflowers to make many recipes including Elderflower Cordial. I really love making my own cordial but you can make these cupcakes using store-bought cordial and they taste just as good.
  • Cupcakes are very easy to make and quick to bake. Therefore, you can whip up a batch in under half an hour. However, you need to allow them to cool completely before you add the buttercream icing otherwise it will just melt into the cakes. I generally make these cakes the day before I plan to eat them so they have plenty of time to cool down.
  • I am not a brilliant icing piper. When I make these cupcakes, I generally simply put a teaspoon of icing onto each cake and smooth it down. I will always add some additional decorative element to make up for my lack of icing skills. If fresh elderflowers are in season, I will add a sprig to each cake. If not, I will add a little grated lemon zest as I think it is helpful to give a clue to the flavour of the cakes.

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Other Elderflower Recipes

I am a big fan of elderflower and love its distinctive floral flavour. I have lots of recipes, some using fresh elderflowers and some which can be made with shop-bought elderflower cordial.

  • Fresh Elderflower Cordial – very easy to make with fresh elderflowers and can be diluted as a drink and also used as a flavouring in other recipes.
  • Home-made Elderflower Gin – very easy to make with fresh elderflowers and great drunk on its own or as the basis for floral cocktails.
  • Elderflower Vinegar – delicious floral flavoured vinegar which is brilliant in salad dressings
  • Simple Elderflower Ice Cream – delicious floral ice cream which can be made using shop-bought elderflower cordial.
  • Elderflower and Gooseberry Sorbet – a refreshing floral sorbet that celebrates the brilliant flavour match of elderflower and gooseberry.
  • Elderflower Pannacotta – light and creamy summer dessert

Recipe for Elderflower and Lemon Cupcakes

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Elderflower and Lemon Cupcake

Elderflower and Lemon Cupcakes

  • Author: Tastebotanical
  • Prep Time: 20
  • Cook Time: 15
  • Total Time: 35 minutes
  • Yield: 24 cakes 1x
  • Category: Cake
  • Method: Baking
  • Cuisine: English
Print Recipe

Description

These scrumptious little cakes, flavoured with elderflower and lemon, are a perfect addition to afternoon tea!

Ingredients

Scale

For the cakes:

  • 250 g (9 oz) salted butter
  • 250 g (9 oz) caster or superfine sugar
  • 4 large eggs
  • 250 (9 oz) g self-raising flour
  • Grated zest of 1 lemon
  • 4 tbs elderflower cordial

For the icing:

  • 450 g (1lb) icing sugar
  • 225 g (8 oz) salted butter
  • 3 tbs elderflower cordial
  • Juice of 1 lemon

Instructions

  1. Set your oven to 200 degrees C/gas mark 6.
  2. Put your cupcake papers into your cupcake trays.
  3. Make the cake batter by creaming together the 250 g butter with the 250 g sugar.   Add the eggs gradually to ensure the mixture does not curdle.  Then add the 250 g self-raising flour.
  4. Add the grated lemon zest and the 4 tbs of cordial to the mixture and stir to combine.
  5. Put a dessert spoon of the cake mixture into each of the cupcake papers.
  6. Put your cupcake trays into the oven and cook for around 15 minutes.  The cakes will be done when they are golden brown and springy to the touch.
  7. Remove the cupcakes from the trays and put on a rack to cool.
  8. Make the icing by putting the 500g icing sugar, 250 g butter, lemon juice and 3 tbs elderflower cordial in a mixing bowl and beating until they form a pale, smooth icing.   Ice the cooled cupcakes and decorate as you wish!

Keywords: elderflower and lemon cake, elderflower cupcakes

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Mango and Lime Ice-cream

Mango
Mango and lime ice-cream

Mango and Lime Ice-cream

What can you do if you have three over-ripe mangoes?  Make ice-cream, of course!   This recipe for Mango and Lime Ice-cream is based on one included in Delia Smith’s Winter Collection – a cookery book I go back to year after year – but I include the lime zest as well as the lime juice as I like a stronger lime flavour.  Also, I generally make it with cream rather than crème fraiche as I am more likely to have this in the house.  Luckily for me, this ice-cream is better if your mangoes are very ripe as this gives it a stronger flavour.

This is a lovely ice-cream – exotic mango and zesty lime –  and very easy to make.  It makes a great dessert following a spicy meal (thai green curry anyone?) but is also very nice eaten straight from the tub in the garden on a hot summer’s day (don’t ask me how I know this!)

Equipment

Liquidiser, mixing bowl, freezer proof dish, Ice Cream Maker  (although you can make it without this – see below)

Mango
Mix the puree and the cream

Print

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Mango

Mango and Lime Ice-cream

  • Author: Tastebotanical
  • Prep Time: 15
  • Cook Time: 15
  • Total Time: 30 minutes
  • Yield: for 6 people 1x
  • Category: Ice-cream
  • Cuisine: English
Print Recipe

Description

This ice-cream combines the fruity deliciousness of mango with a zing of fresh lime.

Ingredients

Scale
  • 120 g caster sugar
  • 3 large, very ripe, mangoes
  • 4 limes
  • 200 ml double cream

Instructions

  1. Put the sugar into a small saucepan together with 150 ml of water. Heat slowly until the sugar is dissolved. Then simmer uncovered for around 15 minutes until the mixture has reduced and looks thick and syrupy.   Remove from heat and allow to cool slightly.
  2. Peel your mangoes, remove the flesh, put it into your liquidiser and blend into a smooth puree.
  3. Put the mango puree into a bowl and add the cooled sugar syrup and the juice and grated zest of the limes.
  4. In a separate bowl (or food processor) whip the cream until it forms soft peaks.
  5. Fold the mango mixture into the whipped cream.
  6. Put the combined mixture into the fridge and allow to get completely cold.
  7. If you have an ice-cream maker, put the mixture into it and process according to instructions.  Once the ice-cream has thickened, transfer it to a freezer-proof container and keep in your freezer until you wish to eat it.
  8. If you do not have an ice-cream maker, you can transfer the mixture straight into the freezer-proof container, freeze for one hour, then stir and return to the freezer.

Keywords: mango and lime ice-cream, mango ice-cream

Mango
Ready to serve!

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