I hate lawn mowers, I really do. In our garden we’ve replaced as much of the grass as possible with useful plants like clover, plantain, dandelion and moss. Of course everyone around us sets out on their dandelion beheading vendetta every Saturday afternoon though.

Health benefits of violets

My hatred for perfectly manicured grass aside, common lawn flowers like violets are not only edible, but medicinal for the body. The leaves and flowers can be prepared a variety of ways. European violets are used for coughs and bronchitis, while their relative the pansy was used as an expectorant, diuretic and to calm inflammation. Violets are one of the featured plants in one of my new favorite books and are used in skincare preparations to calm eczema, psoriasis and acne.

The leaves can be used in salad or to make tea and contain more vitamin C than oranges and more vitamin A than spinach. Even more impressive, violet was used for decades as a natural cancer treatment, primarily by the Native Americans. Current studies confirm violets benefits for an overactive immune system (source)

How to Use Violet Syrup

This violet syrup is delicious over ice cream, stirred into custard or on pancakes and sweet breads. Be careful not to overdue it though, as traditional herbalists used to use violet syrup as a children’s laxative! I’m assuming you would need to down a decent amount though before you had issues with violet’s laxative effects.

Choosing your sugar

Violet syrup is really a two step process. When the flowers are first infused into the water, it turns a deep blue, slightly green color. However, once it’s combined with the lemon juice a chemical reaction takes place and the color changes. If you’re using regular, refined white sugar then it turns a deep violet purple color. I used a slightly less refined evaporated cane crystal that turned my violet syrup a deep ruby red.

I never use white sugar and prefer to sweeten my ice cream, superfood vanilla lattes, and raspberry chocolate mousse with natural sweeteners like raw honey and maple syrup. For this recipe however I did use a mostly refined organic cane sugar. The heavier flavors of honey and coconut sugar drown out the delicate floral taste of the violets. To get the best flavor and purple color you really need the completely white conventional sugar, but I was willing to only compromise so far. Organic evaporated cane juice is as far as I’m willing to go.

What plants do you have growing in your yard? Let us know in the comments below!

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