Guest Post: Fruit & Flower Tower


We're so excited to have another guest post for you today.

A little while ago we stumbled upon the whole family's food blog and fell in love at first sight. Marianne and her sister Kate created their blog in order to share simple, whole food recipes with family and friends, along with other traditional recipes that continue to bring their family together year after year. Amazing pictures, wonderful, healthy recipes - we look forward to every new post! Always a feast for the eyes, and always inspiring! We hope you'll enjoy today's lovely post as much as we do!

Fruit & Flower Tower
by Marianne Brown

Among the women in our family, flowers have always been a popular conversation topic, mostly in discussing how to make a beautiful yard . We grew up surrounded by azaleas, camellias, magnolias, hydrangeas, ivy, iris, dogwood, boxwood, pansies, etc., etc. Even now, if the weather is nice, and the sun is still out, we may call home and Mama will probably be 'out in the yard.'






Indoors we enjoyed table arrangements and randomly placed bud vases of cut flowers, but eating them was never considered. Of course, all flowers are not edible, many of them even poisonous, but there are several varieties which can be enjoyed. These sweet little violas have a mild flavor making them the perfect garnish for any salad, dessert, or cocktail. Now is the time to enjoy these edible gifts from the yard!


Fruit & Flower Tower
Preptime: 10 min/ serves: 3-4

1/4 cups picked violas
1 red apple (any crisp red variety: honey crisp, fungi, etc.)
1 granny smith apple
1 pear (anjou pear used here)
1 orange
1 lemon
2oz.+ gruyere cheese
1/4 cups + arugula
3 Tbsp. olive oil​
sea salt​
fresh ground pepper​
orange zest

Pick your violas just before you get ready to use them. If you must pre-pick, store them on a damp paper towel in a air tight container in the refrigerator. Remove all stems and greenery from the base of flowers before eating.* Next, make thin slices of your apples, pear, and cheese. For slicing we used a mandoline, coring and slicing our fruit into 1/8" slices. Place slices in a bowl and squeeze lemon juice over all fruit slices to prevent them from turning brown.

Next, simply layer slices- pear, apple, apple, cheese, and so on. You may make your stack as tall as you would like. This will determine the number of servings. When done, top each tower with arugula and flowers. Then drizzle with olive oil and juice from 1/4 orange slice on each serving. To finish, sprinkle with orange zest, good sea salt, and fresh ground pepper. Enjoy!

*Many flower varieties are poisonous. Please educate yourself on edible varieties. Also, as with trying any new food, do not eat five pounds of any edible flower in your first sitting. Using them as a garnish will likely have a mild effect should any allergies exist. Overall, flowers are wonderful for you!

For more, please visit - 42 Flowers You Can Eat​

From our partner: LO+JUNE

From our partner: LO+JUNE
Artisanal French products in our Swiss fine food boutique