so out came the tea set and the brand new pink teapot and we ate a floral inspired spread all washed down with black earl grey tea.

rosemary scones topped with cream cheese, white grapes and parma ham

take an ordinary scone recipe, replace the sugar with flour, add 2 tsps of chopped fresh rosemary and a pinch of fresh ground black pepper.

violet petal shortbread

a basic vanilla shortbread recipe with a small piece of crystallised violet pressed in to the top whilst they are cooling.

lemon and rose drizzle cake

taking this recipe as a starting point, use 2 tbsp of rosewater for the cake mixture instead of lemon juice. For the drizzle, use a mixture of 2 tbsp rosewater/1 tbsp lemon juice to prevent too strong a perfumey taste and add a little pink food colouring. decorate with rose petals instead of lemon zest. It needs baking for 50 – 60 mins max though – not 1hr 15 like the recipe suggests.

Perfect for a beautiful sunny day. Happy birthday mum!

I took a basic cupcake recipe, swapped 45g of flour for ground pistachio nuts, added the seeds of three cardamon pods and replaced 1tbsp of milk with orange flower water.

The icing is cream cheese frosting with orange flower water instead of vanilla essence. The rose petals bring all the delicate flavours together beautifully.

one to make again for sure.

i’m much liking cooking with edible flower petals at the moment. these meringues have rosewater and rose petals folded into the cream that holds them together.

I love the process of making them – there is something very satisfying about turning plain old egg white in to something beautifully glossy and light.

next time, I’m going to make them bite sized so they melt in the mouth. yum.

I will make rose cupcakes soon but fancied a change today so used the rose petals in shortbread.

I used a standard recipe but removed 25g of sugar and replaced it with 25g rose petals. I also added a few drops of rosewater to bring the mixture together. Using my heart shaped cookie cutter seemed appropriate too.

They are very yummy. I think they will be even better with rose tea. A treat for another day!

I’ve wanted to make these for ages but was too lazy to whisk the egg whites by hand.

The pink ones have rose water in the shells and buttercream with fresh raspberries as the filling. The creamy ones have vanilla seeds in the shell and are sandwiched with slightly salty caramel.

I now have a new technique to perfect! watch this space…