The Scented Kitchen: Cooking with Flowers

Using flowers in the kitchen is growing fast in popularity, and Frances Bissell's gloriously inventive recipes allow readers to move beyond mixing a few nasturtium petals into a salad to enjoy the scents and flavours of a wide variety of wild and garden flowers including lavender, elderflower, fennel, roses, marigolds, violets and jasmine. By flavouring basic ingredients, she helps the cook to transform other dishes - elderflower vinegar, for example, lifts an ordinary green salad to the level of a subtly perfumed treat, while lavender-flavoured honey is as delicious on toast as it is when used to flavour roast duck. Amongst the succulent recipes offered here are Mussels in Cider and Saffron; Nasturtium, Carrot and Celery Risotto; Stuffed Chicken Breasts with Roses and Cucumber; Warm Chocolate Lavender Cake; and Orange and Fennel Flower Sorbet. And, just in case toiling in a flower-scented kitchen is thirsty work, Frances Bissell helps the reader to concoct Frozen Elderflower Margarita, Lavender julep and other seductive floral cocktails …