Let Your Autumn Meals Flower

Flowers as food are their own form of poetry; they speak the language of the soul. Flowers have an uncanny way of reminding us of the fragility of days as they constantly bloom and wilt and bloom again. Autumn is often associated with ending, but we have always seen it as a place of new, extraordinary beginnings. It is filled with vibrancy and the bitter chill that kisses our cheeks and turns them pink as young rosebuds, infuses the days with a frenetic creative energy. It is a time steeped in magic. In the kitchen, it is a time when dishes can inspire all of our senses to come alive.

Our wish, during these challenging and transformational times, is to inspire small moments of beauty, to encourage each person to take time to sit with beautiful flavors in our present season of life and simply to be with them. We love that love is still conquering, that beauty can be found in even the harshest places.

There is something captivating about edible flowers strewn across a plate, or biting into a rosemary blossom and all the flavor pops on your tongue. It becomes a feast not just for your taste buds but for your eyes, for your nose and even for your ears.

Many edible flowers are easy to grow in pots in urban settings or on a little piece of land (see page 18). These are ingredients that are accessible and/ or easily plucked from your garden.

Food and flowers together seem to create an inclusive and loving space for every being on earth to savor and enjoy. During the hardest times, we have looked upon flowers and found ourselves infused with hope and a quiet joy. Perhaps something in the way they change through the seasons, or how they grow in places they should not be able to survive, remind us that we are all capable of seemingly impossible things.

Cheers to finding joy in the slow moments of life, to embracing the natural beauty that is at our fingertips and to loving each other fiercely as we build a brave new world.