Edible chrysanthemum petals (shokuyō-giku) ✦

Pétales de chrysanthème comestible

What it is

Yamagata’s purple variety is called motte-no-hoka, which means outrageous; the story goes that eating a flower bearing the imperial crest was the outrage, though growers will tell you it only ever meant outrageously good. The petals are stripped from the head and steamed into dried sheets called kiku-nori, so an autumn flower can be eaten in February.

In the kitchen

Add a tablespoon of rice vinegar per litre to the blanching water and give the petals twenty seconds — the acid fixes the purple, which otherwise goes grey-brown in front of you. Squeeze gently and dress them warm; cold petals lose the silkiness that is the whole point.

Goes with

Rice vinegar Koikuchi shoyu Katsuobushi (dried bonito) Sesame Daikon Yuzu

Same species

Dried chrysanthemum flower

In season alongside

Citron Artichoke Avola almond Sweetfish (ayu) Bergamot Calendula

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