Some Orchids Look Good Enough to Eat

We’ve spoken about the similarities and differences between orchids and onions, but according to one website, just as onions can flower, orchids are edible too.

Aside from providing us with vanilla, which is fairly well-known, orchid farmers in Singapore have recently began to conduct cooking classes using orchids. Introducing stir-fried orchids and orchid sauces, they say that orchids are a source of fiber and vitamin C. So what do they taste like? Opinions vary; some say it is somewhat sweet, others say it tastes like tannin or raw chives. Perhaps it depends on the orchid used.

People in Hawaii have used orchids in salad dishes, or sautéed with scallops. They’ve even made sugar coated orchid candies since the 1960’s.

In the southern African region of Tanzania, Zambia and Malawi, orchid tubers have long been used as a source of food. Traded locally between the three countries, they are used in the preparation of a meatless sauce. Unfortunately, the harvesting has been done in an unsustainable manner, and now threatens the future of the species and their associated biological diversity in the natural habitats.

In Turkey, the ground-up bulbs of local terrestrial orchids are used to make a mucilaginous compound known as salep. This material is often used to make a particularly sweet and distinctive ice cream in Turkey and throughout the Middle East. The unsustainable nature of their harvest techniques has driven the species to extinction in many Middle Eastern countries.

Locals use another South American orchid as a curdling agent to make cheese. What is it called? Why, the cheese orchid, of course.

Actually, since no orchid is poisonous, all orchids are edible. But before you take a bite of the nearest bloom, you’ll want to wait at least a month for all the pesticides to be cleansed from the plant. It might be better to find a plant specifically grown for food.