My husband has become quite the budding cocktail connoisseur. We don’t go out as much these days – we’ve a three-month-old baby to attend to – and so drinking cocktails in the garden is about as wild as it gets around here. Bottles of Suze and shakers appear on the worktop around 7pm, and if we’re lucky, the baby’s down around the same time a white negroni is plonked on the makeshift table outside.
The more his barkeeping skills advance, the worse mine become. I’m now barely aware of what’s in the fridge, and tend to invite guests to sort themselves out if I’m hosting them alone. But what I can offer are garnishes in the form of edible flowers – one of the great magic tricks of the garden at this time of year. They often have heartier flavours than their appearance might suggest, offering a hint of pepper (nasturtium) or spice (pinks) to an aperitif.
Edible flowers are a great acid test of horticultural interest and courage: dare you swallow a tiny pastel viola, floating atop a coupe containing St Germain and prosecco? Would you leave a marigold adrift among the ice, or give it an inquisitive nibble? I’ve taken secret delight in adorning chocolate cakes in a rainbow of petals at this time of year – borage (particularly good in G&Ts), cornflowers, roses and fennel are among the long list of flowers that you can eat – mostly to see what gets picked off and what devoured.
You probably have more edible flowers in your garden than you’re aware of. Daisies, for instance, have a slightly bitter, nutty taste while the fellow lawn-dwelling dandelions have a whiff of honey about them. There’s also a lot to be said for making the most of edible crops that have bolted. Rocket flowers are among my favourite salad surprises, with delicate, four-petalled white leaves that carry a distinctive dark brown stripe.
There’s an argument in dedicating a large container to edible flowers, perhaps planting the swift-to-germinate nasturtiums and calendula alongside other cocktail garnishes, such as thyme or rosemary (mint gets its own dedicated pot, otherwise it’ll take over everything), and inviting people to pick their own. But the more particular mixologists will want to head out in the morning before it gets too hot and harvest them before leaves wilt; pop them in a plastic container in the fridge and get them out as you reach for the ice.
I’m also a fan of making cocktail ingredients from the garden. Save deadheadings of roses or geraniums – those crispy leaves underneath, especially – to boil into syrups with water, sugar and perhaps some lemon. I bottle them up and pop them in the fridge for a taste of the garden in the heat. Just don’t ask me to make you anything stronger.
