We’re coming into peak season for leaves and fresh vegetables now – see the excellent Steve’s Leaves for a round-up of what’s hot and seasonal in terms of edible foliage – and that’s an added bonus for the many cookery schools that cultivate their own kitchen gardens.
The pitch-perfect Thyme at Southrop (pictured, above) offers Sow and Grow courses and even one on Edible Flowers. The latter is a blossoming trend, what with the Chelsea Flower Show and menus springing up all over SW3 topped with delicate and colourful buds.
Peter Jones, the department store on Sloane Square, is offering a blooming botanical breakfast which includes a freshly baked warm poppy seed bloomer with thyme butter and lavender honey, a soft buttermilk, rose petal and blueberry muffin blossoming with edible flowers.
In Dorset, the irrepressible Mat Follas runs popular wild foraging and seafood courses from his Wild Garlic restaurant, where he chalks up the finds of the day minutes before opening. Mat, too, loves to sprinkle a flower or two over a dish.
While much further West in Cornwall the Walled Garden Cookery School is taking bookings for its autumn courses – unfortunately it had to cancel its summer schedule – that combine hands-on gardening with gastro skills.
