Blooming delicious
If you love daylilies, you’ll be delighted to know they’re a delicious option in the kitchen too.
The daylilies in my garden were on notice of imminent removal when I discovered they were edible. My twitch-ridden plants are about as far away from the kitchen as they could be. That they are edible was the last thing I would have imagined.
I do enjoy their early summer show. They assert their presence with showy, trumpet-shaped blooms in glorious, bold colours. Orange, bronze, yellow and mahogany-red. They remind me of lions and tigers.
But eating them had never crossed my mind.
However, in the Far East the daylily ( Hemerocallis sp.) is a delicacy, more often grown for its food and medicinal values than its exotic display. All parts of the plant can be eaten, from young leaves to the white-fleshed rhizomes.
Most highly prized are the young flower buds and blossoms, which have a sweet, flowery taste and a sticky, jelly-like texture. They also contain good amounts of protein and Vitamin A.
In Asian markets, the slender, goldencaramel coloured flower buds are sold dried or fresh as gum jum or golden needles. Their earthy, sweet flavour complements steamed or stir-fried dishes, hot and sour soups, daylily soup, and mooshoo pork.
The roots are eaten too, lightly cooked or raw. They have a crisp, sweetish, nutty taste, rather like salsify.
Even if eating them does not appeal, there are plenty of other reasons to grow these versatile perennials. Hemerocallis comes from the Greek words 'hemera' (day) and 'kalos' (beauty). The exceptionally showy flowers and the plant's hardiness have made these natives of Asia popular around the world.
As the name suggests, most flowers open for a single day. Some varieties last two to three days, and a few open in the evening. A well-tended clump may produce as many as 400 flowers over 40 days. The trumpet-shaped flowers have six large petals, six long stamens, and a central style. Each flower stalk bears 6-8 flowers.
They are an excellent substitute for lilies. As a cut flower they will not last as long but they make up for it by their adaptability – surviving and thriving where lilies won't – in drought, cold, and clay, you name it. They flower well in sun or shade. They look great along the sides of paths, in light woodland, and on banks.
My primitive, impoverished collection is a microscopic selection of what is available. But daylilies are a prized garden perennial, and popularity is demonstrated in the effort expended on breeding. A whopping 80,000 registered cultivars have been developed from the 19 recognised species, with hundreds being added yearly. ( Warning – not all of them will taste good!).
Hybridisation has vastly extended the colour palette from the yellow-orangepale pink of the genus to reds, purples, lavenders, greens, near-black, near-white. There's no true blue (yet), in spite of efforts.
Desirable breeding traits in the flowers include the large flower size, ruffled edges, and contrasting ‘eyes' in the centre. There is even an illusion of glitter called ‘diamond dust'.
Romantic names have been rhapsodised, which confusingly often fail to include their species parentage. Those that have gained The Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit include ‘Beauty to Behold', ‘Mahogany Magic', ‘Fooled Me', ‘Moonlit Masquerade' and ‘Cat Dancer'.
The result is that there is a daylily for almost any garden, from short to tall, with single, ruffled and double flowers, and flowering times from early to late summer.
Hemerocallis fulva – probably what's in my garden – is a common species, typically in shades of orange, sometimes coloured with bronze, yellow or red. It is also often known as Tawny Daylily, Tiger Lily, Roadside Lily and Ditch Lily. Less auspiciously, it was named as the Outhouse Lily because people would plant it near outdoor toilets.
They are on planting lists for gray water wetlands, an attractive proposition for septic tank fields.
Despite persistent neglect, my daylilies have never missed a beat. Apparently they prefer wetter soils, but mine survive hot summers, just out of reach of the sprinklers. They seem impervious to pests. The only problem I've had is invasions of twitch and I can hardly blame them for that!
It seems I may have to rethink my plan to toss my daylilies and find a more kitchen-accessible spot to grow them. With a little more TLC we could be enjoying better and bigger flowers and harvesting some of the excess for the cook to experiment with.
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