My husband visited our relative and harvested lots of vegetables last November, one of which was chrysanthemum.
In traditional Japanese cooking, we don’t really use edible flowers a lot, except for chrysanthemum and nanohana (canola flowers).
Typically chrysanthemums are used for sunomono, Japanese vinegared food.
But we got quite a lot, so I used some for miso soup.
To prepare, I picked petals off from the flowers and boiled quickly in the hot water with vinegar.
In the miso soup, I added Chinese yum together with chrysanthemum. Both of them are good for health – they have been used as traditional natural medicine.
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I’ve never seen chrysanthemum used in food before- I didn’t even know you could eat it to be honest! How interesting! What does it taste like? Or is it just eaten for the health benefits?
I think chrysanthemum is eaten in other parts of east Asia as well. In Japan, it’s especially well consumed in northern areas. It tastes unique…a bit bitter and a bit sweet. Some people love it, saying it’s tasty. For me, to be honest, it tastes just OK… I feel it tastes “flower”…