Free Recipe Crystallized Flowers

Recipe Type: Free Misc Recipes
Recipe Preparation:
Cooking Temperature:
Recipe Serves: 1

Ingredients for Crystallized Flowers Recipe

1 oz Gum arabic crystals (or
-powder)
4 tb Rosewater
Superfine sugar (castor
-sugar)
Fresh edible (unsprayed)
-flowers** or leaves
Wax or silicone paper
sm Paintbrush
sm Screwtop jar

Crystallized Flowers Preparation

(from _Cake Decorating_ by Judy Kelsey, with modifications suggested by Martha Stewart, who uses egg whites to do this) 1) Place the gum arabic and the rosewater in a screwtop jar and leave for two or three days for the gum arabic to dissolve. When the crystals have dissolved, the mixture will look like thin honey (viscous and pale gold). 2) Prepare a shallow bowl filled with superfine sugar (which is much finer than regular granulated sugar and looks prettier on the flowers). 3) Cover a tray with waxed paper or silicone paper. 4) Hold a flower (or leaf) by its stem and very carefully paint it with the gum arabic mixture. Don’t coat it too heavily. Paint both sides. 5) Hold the wet flower over the bowl of sugar and (using a teaspoon) sprinkle it evenly with sugar. Turn it over and do the back side, too. 6) Shake off the excess sugar (tap your hand on the side of the bowl) and then place the coated flower on the wax- or silicone-paper-covered tray. 7) Leave to dry for 3-4 days. I leave mine in my gas oven. With the pilot light’s warmth, they are usually ready in a couple of days. BE CAREFUL if you do this. I foolishly pre-heated my oven without thinking and blackened a batch of lovely pansies and johnny-jump-ups. :-( Now I tape a sign on the oven control to remind me that I have FLOWERS IN OVEN! 8) After the flowers or leaves are dry, clip off their stems and place them in an airtight container. I use a shallow Rubbermaid container and put layers of waxed paper in between the layers of flowers. 9) Stored away from light and heat, these are supposed to stay usable and retain their color for a year. I have only kept them for a couple of months, so I can’t say from experience. They are VERY FRAGILE, however, so be careful not to drop them or the container they are stored in. These look absolutely wonderful on a frosted cake, but they can be served as little (fat-free) treats on their own with a nice cup of tea or coffee. Depending on what type of flower you use, they can either taste like a very exotic perfume, or like little sugar candies. Mint leaves are fantastic this way!! **Some edible flowers suitable for candying include pansies, johnny-jump-ups (viola tricolor), violets, primroses, and dianthus. Many people candy rose petals, too, but I haven’t had any luck with these looking good. Other edible flowers for other purposes (salads, etc) are daylilles (buds, flowers, and tubers), marigold (calendula officinalis only!), nasturiums, sunflowers, and zucchini flowers. Posted to fatfree digest V97 #178 by Lisa T. Bennett <lbennett@coe.uga.edu> on Aug 13, 1997

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