Angelica is an edible flower that ranges in color from pink to blue to lavender. Angelica buds have a bit of a licorice taste so they go great with poppy seed cake or lemon cakes. They also make a nice garnish for Edam cheeses and caraway type cheeses. An angelica blossom also makes a good garnish for drinks made with Sambuca or Pernod.
Almost any cake or pudding looks great garnished with dark or white chocolate curls. Simply use a paring knife to slice the curls off of a chunk of chocolate that has been cooled in the fridge in a while. White or dark chocolate curls look great on bed of whipped cream on hot drinks such as caffe lattes or hot chocolate.
Apple Blossoms are a really nice interesting garnish and like apples they are edible. They go well perched on the edge of a glass of brandy and of course you can sprinkle them on Apple Brown Betty’s or apple cake.
To make a lacy pattern out of icing sugar for the top of a cake simply take a doily, place it over the top of the uniced cake and sprinkle the icing sugar over it. Lift the doily gently and you have an elegantly decorated cake.
Marzipan is not just used for cake decorating. You can buy premade sheets of marzipan and use them the same way you would use modeling clay to make any shape you want. Marzipan looks great garnishing any kind of cake or cookie. To make marzipan carrots to decorate a carrot cake simply roll tubular carrot shapes out of orange marzipan and top them with a button of green marzipan.
If marzipan hardens while you are making cake decorations this does not mean the marzipan has gone bad. Simply add a bit of water, the same way you would add water to modeling clay, and it will become soft and pliant again.
To make a strawberry fan, use a paring knife to slice thee strawberry from a point slightly below the top stem to the bottom. Continue making thin slits from one end of the strawberry to the other. Gently spread the segments of strawberry apart to create the strawberry fan,
If you want a add an unusual splash of color to the top of a white iced cake or a fruit fool try sprinkling the top with edible violet blossoms. Violet blossoms also look nice frozen in ice cubes or on top of a salad to give it a dash of purple.
Author Archives: Jennifer
Tips for Decorating Bloody Marys and Caesars
If you are sick of just sticking the same old stalk of celery in a drink don’t despair. Try sticking flowering alliums, which come from the onion family into a drink. These types of “onion flowers” impart a delicate taste to the drink.
A nice way to garnish a bloody mary or ceasar would be to puree some pesto with some sour cream and drool it on the top in a squiggly or spiral shape. Then top it with a sprig of parsley
To give a glass rim an usual “frosting” try dipping the wetting the rim of a glass and dipping it in Jerk Spice or some other type of exotic herb or spice.
If you decide to decorate with olives why not intersperse them with chunks of cheese as well.
The blue blossoms are edible and they have a mild taste that is reminiscent of cucumber. Borage makes a very interesting garnish sprinkled on top of ceasar. They look quite pretty floating in any drink.
To make stuffed mushrooms slice off the stem of a whole, clean, mushroom. With a small teaspoon (1/8 or 1/4 teaspoon), or small melon baller, scoop out the inside of the mushroom. Fill with a favorite dip or fill with bread crumbs and blue cheese and melt under the broiler for a few minutes.
For an unusual garnish for a martini stuff a big black olive with blue cheese and spear it. The blue cheese will also subtly flavor the drink.
To make carrot curls simply use a vegetable peeler to cut a long strip off of the carrot. Spear each curl with a toothpick and then chill them in hot water until they are ready to use. These look great coiled up in a Bloody Mary.
Chrysanthemums are tangy yet slightly bitter buds that in colors from red, white, yellow and orange. They range in taste from faint peppery to mild cauliflower. They add a kind of Asian flavored twist to tomato-based cocktails. They look gorgeous suspended in tomato aspic. Sprinkle the petals in a salad or on the surface of a bowl of tomato soup to add visual interest.
To make a really unusual looking garnish a bloody Mary simply drop one whole dandelion blossom into the center of the bowl or the glass. Make sure you buy your dandelion blossoms from a specialty market. Dandelions add a slight peppery taste to dishes.