Edible Flowers for Tiki garnish?

When mixing at home, I've been garnishing with cherries, mint, pineapple, etc, mostly when friends stop by.

However, we're planning a larger party over the Summer to celebrate the "opening" of a home tiki bar I'm currently building, so my thoughts have turned to using orchids to garnish some cocktails with a little extra flair.

Two questions:

1. Is it necessary to seek out "edible flowers" for tiki garnish? I was planning to just go to my local flower shop to get flowers, but my wife (the cake decorator) assures me that I should be looking for edible grade flowers that are untouched by pesticides (which makes sense). Is this the case?

2. if so, does anyone know a good source of edible flowers? I live in NJ, and work in NYC, so a good source in that area would be appreciated.

Thanks!

This is an article I found helpful when I had the same questions last year when I had a party to introduce my tiki bar to the world. This is a great time of year to hit up local farmers markets too. You're sure to find some good stuff. If not, NY is full of upscale markets that are sure to have an edible botanical section. Good luck and post pics!

http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/food-recipes/cooking/tips/a25640/how-to-use-edible-flowers/

I keep planting edible flowers in my garden just so I can have them readily available. Most upscale tiki bars use the purple and white orchids. I guess you could do some internet research for the color scheme you are going for to find the right match.

Here are a couple from Latitude 29 from this weekend...

[ Edited by: lunavideogames 2015-05-20 17:43 ]

I like sweet --not overly sweet--tiki drinks and have been experimenting with these hibiscus flowers in syrup.
They are pretty interesting and can be found at BevMo and I am sure other booze warehouses.

The syrup tastes good in daiquiris and we even made a hibiscus mai tai that was rather awesome.
Just a suggestion!

On 2015-05-20 11:56, Thrift Tiki wrote:
I like sweet --not overly sweet--tiki drinks and have been experimenting with these hibiscus flowers in syrup.
They are pretty interesting and can be found at BevMo and I am sure other booze warehouses.

The syrup tastes good in daiquiris and we even made a hibiscus mai tai that was rather awesome.
Just a suggestion!

Wow...gonna have to seek that out here in SoCal and try some. Thanks for the info :drink:

You can 'detox' flowers from a store just in case too. My husband raises Dart frogs in a vivarium. To make the plants chemical free he'd wash the soil they came in before planting and then temporarily plant them in organic soil. After about a month they were chemical free and good to go in the tank. But those plants you couldn't remove all the soil from the roots with out risking damage to the plant.

You can do the same thing in a week or two(I'd lean towards two to be safe) if you remove all the soil/what ever they used for substrate(ours came in foam). Give it a gentle wash to remove any surface chemicals and then treat it like an air plant, misting it daily.

Thrift Tiki, thanks for the heads-up on the hibiscus. I picked some up at BevMo and tried them in champagne - very good! Look a bit like baby squids though :lol:

[ Edited by: MadDogMike 2015-06-10 10:42 ]

Here is another garnish thread you might enjoy