Using herbs, flowers and fruit for flavored sugars and salts

Saturday, December 16, 2017

You can flavor sugar and salt with homegrown herbs, fruits, and flowers from the garden.  It is simple and fun.  Let your tastebuds and creativity run wild.  These are fun gifts as well.

Some ideas for flavored sugars:

Lavendar

Mint

Kumquat (the rind is sweet and citrusy)

Lemon

Lime

Rose hips or petals (gives off a beautiful fragrance in tea)

Sage

Berries

Dry your ingredients first.  For citrus peels, rose hips, or rose petals, I let dry in the pantry on a paper towel.  For berries, I would dry in a dehydrator or an oven.  Herbs I put loosely in a paper bag with the stems upright to dry.  Harvesting and drying herbs  After they are dry, you can use a coffee grinder to grind to a fine powder, crush the herbs by hand, or for larger pieces, leave whole and mix 50/50 with organic sugar.

There are many flowers that are edible.  I love planting my edible garden in the flower beds.  It does double duty, provides beauty and attracts pollinators to have a more productive garden.  Here is a blog on varieties that are edible:  Flowers that are edible

For ideas on growing your own fruit in small spaces, Fruit for small spaces

For salt, you use fine sea salt to use out of a shaker or coarse sea salt to use in a grinder.  

Ideas for flavored salt:

Hot peppers

Thyme

Oregano

Mint

Sage

Rosemary

My favorite steak and grilled veggie seasoning recipe:

5/8 cup coarse sea salt

2 tablespoons small hot peppers

2 tablespoons juniper berries

4 bay leaves

1 tablespoon rosemary

2 sticks of cinnamon or turmeric

1 1/2 tablespoons sage

This is great on anything you grill!

If you are thinking of starting a garden, herbs are the perfect start.  Most are perennials (come back every year) and they thrive on neglect.  You truly plant and forget.  A bonus is that herbs give you tons each season so are a great cost saver.  Start a kitchen herb garden!

You can easily make pretty gifts for others using herbs and flowers from the garden in pretty containers.