Woohoo, it’s finally that time! We are bringing back Flower Friday! For the uninitiated, years ago, we decided to start doing this while our vast array of flowers produce. For our Friday posts, we do a deep dive into a specific flower genus or some other topic that is heavily influenced by or focused entirely on flowers.
We’ve found it vitally important in our vegetable production to also maintain a flower garden. It greatly aids in bringing in pollinators, effectively putting our garden “on the map” for those bees and bugs that are so critical to fruit production. These posts allow us to focus on that effort at least one day a week.
In these posts, we try to create a deeply informative post that covers things like growing characteristics, medicinal benefits, historical and cultural significance, culinary applications along with many interesting tidbits about that particular flower or flower concept. These posts do tend to be our less popular ones, but we also know many of you truly appreciate them. So we do truly appreciate those of you who regularly support them with those likes and comments!
We almost always start the season with one of our all time favorites and earliest producers, the Viola. If you were with us last year, you might recall that we grew violas in actual production and created a DIY Creme De Violette liqueur that turned out fantastic! We mixed up many authentic Aviation cocktails this winter with that liqueur! We’re also dialing that experiment up to 11 this year with something really unique, but it’s top secret for now!
Violas are the largest genus in the violaceae family, comprised of over 680 individual species. Though most know the genus through the popular Johnny Jump Up variety, we enjoy them for its much lesser known varieties. Though both pansy and viola are within the same family, violas are known for their smaller stature compared to the pansy.
There is massive variety and color spectrum and visual appearance within the viola family, truly allowing the grower to diversify among color and style. While most species are grown as annuals, there are a few known perennial species within the viola family that can be found in warmer climates.
A unique aspect of violas is that they feature what’s called bilateral symmetry, or basically they are mirrored left to right a lot like the human body. In fact, this often allows the flower to present almost a face-like appearance in many species, with some reporting to see cat, dog or human faces.
Many species of viola produce a phytochemical called ionone, which has the physiological effect of desensitizing nose receptors. For this reason, you can often smell them on a first whiff, but then their aroma will be rather elusive after that. The vast species differentiation allows some to smell like wintergreen, pea, perfume and there’s even a vanilla scented variety. In Tolouse, France, growers create a rare candied viola treat using egg and crystallized sugar.
Almost all species of viola are edible, contributing widely to culinary applications. The flowers are frequently used in plate decoration, garnishment and visual decoration within the bartending world. Cake decorators often favor the flower for bakery focused uses. As we mentioned previously, they can also be used for flavor and color extraction in DIY liqueurs, allowing the crafter to develop deep color variety using infusion techniques.
Medicinally, viola produce strong antioxidants, with effective anti-microbial and insecticidal activity. The flower has shown effective applications in providing cough suppression for children with asthmatic conditions. It can also be used to treat dermatitis and a few other skin conditions, typically prepared in a topical formulation. Viola were also studied during the peak of the AIDS epidemic, with several studies showing strong and promising activity in those studies.
Of all the flowers we grow, viola are perhaps the most diversified. We typically grow 6 to 10 varieties, taking advantage of that massive genus. We do find that a few self-seed each season, even in subarctic conditions, which we absolutely love. We don’t find them invasive, given their small stature, but the grower should be aware they’ll likely also be growing volunteers for years after growing them.
We’re glad to be back at our flower Fridays! Enjoy the weekend, everyone!
