Edible Flowers for Winter Weddings

I love it when prospective brides phone up and say “I’ve been looking at your wonderful website (and it is!) and I’d like some edible flowers and floral salad for my wedding”.

My immediate response is usually something along the lines of “Marvellous, congratulations by the way, and what’s the date of your wedding?” If the response is anywhere between March and November then I will happy natter on about all the choices and flavours available.

If the answer is December, January or February then my heart does a little wobble.  Edible flowers for winter weddings…..hmmm.

We are officially closed at that time of year and are completely at the beck and call of the British weather. But this is tropical Devon and I know we should have something but I can make no guarantees. We are a small business, certified organic and take this seriously. We don’t therefore heat our polytunnels. What is in season is in season and that is that.

Salad wise we have a good selection in the tunnels but it is nice to add sprigs of sorrel, flat leaf parsley and the wide selection of mustards growing in the field. Flower wise it is all winter hardy varieties that are growing in the polytunnel – violas, calendulas, primulas and pansies and they start to flower when they are good and ready.

So that is what I say. I advise that we keep in touch and speak two weeks before the wedding by which time I will know exactly what we will have and in what quantities. And I keep everything crossed…. fingers, toes… you name it.

Winter floral salad from Maddocks Farm Organics.

This year we’re lucky…so far. Whilst a lot of the country is blanketed in snow we’ve got away with a few frosty nights and nothing worse. So this weekend’s West Country wedding will have floral salad and some extra edible flowers to garnish their buffet.  But next year….next week even….everything might be different.

Spicy flowering radish sprigs  make a lovely crunchy addition to the salad.

A selection of early edible flowers picked in January at Maddocks Farm Organics. 

 

 

Edible Flowers for Winter Weddings