Go botanical: mango salad with edible flowers

"Mama, you are not going to eat that?! That's flowers!" Going botanical in cooking is one of the recent trends (or more likely, the one that has gone back in fashion). And while I often use the rose petals in cooking (as well as primroses in spring), I was thrilled to discover that Abel & Cole sell the edible flowers. This recipe for Mango salad with edible flowers is easy to make, very pretty to look at and tastes great.

Mango salad with edible flowers
Ingredients:
1 ripe mango
1 carrot, grated
a handful of red currants
several flowers of calendula, marigold and nasturtium
2 tbsp olive oil
1tbsp honey + more for drizzling over
2 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice

Grate the carrot and mix with the calendula petals (3 flowers). Add the olive oil, lemon juice and honey, mix well. Slice the mango and arrange the slices on a plate. Put the carrot mix in the middle, top up with a few mango slices. Scatter the red currants and more flowers. Drizzle good dark honey over the salad.
It was amazingly good. Really, really tasty, I must say I didn't expect that I would like it so much.
Calendula, marigold and nasturtium petals are so vibrant and add a fun healthy note to any salad.
Marigold petals have a rather peppery note, and I can imagine they would work beautifully in savoury salads, with rocket, pears and blue cheese.

I wish I could say the flowers came from my garden, but I didn't plant any calendulas or marigolds this year. This little box of edible flowers is available from Abel & Cole, and don't they look pretty?!

If you can't use them quickly, you can easily dry the marigold and calendula petals and cook with them later. Many years ago, when I hosted a Tudor-themed dress party for my 30th birthday, I baked a cake with the dried calendula petals. This was a recipe from a cook book which contained Elizabethan recipes. I have lost that recipe and cannot remember the name of the book. The cake was lovely. You can also add the dried petals to black tea and make a flavoured tea. I have read you can add them when making tortillas, but I haven't yet tried that, it will be my next project.

Have you ever tried the edible flowers?

I'm also submitting this recipe to Ren Behan's 'Simple & In Season' blog event, you can see the other entries for June.