Foraging fun

On Monday, for my Sabbath 'fun thing', I went for a wander looking for edible plants.  I was particularly interested in nasturtiums and jasmine, both of which I'd recently learned could be used to make cordial.  I was also wanting to see if I could ID some giant daisies that I was hoping might be edible oxeye daisies.

Success on all fronts!

nasturtium flowers - about 2/3 of an ice cream container worth

soaking in boiling hot sugar syrup

lots of jasmine flowers.  They smelled amazing!

jasmine flowers, plucked off their stems and soaking in boiling hot sugar syrup

steeping overnight

after straining the next morning.  The colours really surprised me - pink from the orange and yellow nasturtiums; yellow from the pink and white jasmine!

bottled and ready to use.  This one works nicely as a cordial, thinned down with plain water.  It's unusual, but a nice mix of floral and spicy.

jasmine 'cordial', which turned out to be incredibly strong!  About 1/2 a teaspoon is all you need in a whole glass of water - hence the small bottles I put it in.  It's really nice added to ginger tea.   I think it'd be good mixed with a lime cordial.  I think it'd be amazing in icing, and also for jasmine jamun (i.e. gulab jamun, but with jasmine instead of rose).

mint kefir also turned out even nicer with a hint of jasmine :-)

 

If you'd like to have a go, look at my notes on nasturtium cordial and sweet jasmine essence.

And the daisies were, indeed, oxeye daisies - with thanks to this site, which also listed the things they're most commonly confused with, meaning I'm pretty confident of my ID.

the leaves are currently stashed in our fridge.  They're a curious flavour - bitter, perfumy and grassy all at once.  I had some chopped over fried egg for lunch today it worked really well.  I also think they'd be a nice addition to a salad, but in 'herb' rather than 'lettuce' quantities!

and I'm enjoying the flowers on my dresser, in a vase that used to belong to my Grandma :-)