Dried Wild Violet Sprinkles

I love these so much.
I love everything about them.

Straight from the earth, very easy to prepare- with no dehydrator or special equipment needed.
Unless you consider a twist tie and a string as special equipment…

Plus: no food dyes, no sugar, no additives, no gluten, no bad stuff at all.
Heck, these even have some nutrients in them!

Natural, organic purple sprinkles. This is gourmet foraging!

Did I mention how incredibly gorgeous these are? I wouldn’t hesitate one bit to use these as a decoration for wedding cupcakes. A cheap, elegant, and rustic wedding cake decoration!

Or decoration for baby shower cupcakes!
Or bridal shower cupcakes!

Or simply, beautiful birthday cake sprinkles for a little girl who can’t have food dyes, gluten, or the sugars that are found in most commercial sprinkles, but still deserves a pretty treat on her special day.

To me, these have no detectable flavor, which I like!

If you don’t have wild violets growing all over your yard, consider these other options for natural dried flower sprinkles- they would all make gorgeous, healthy sprinkles (affiliates):
Dried Organic Butterfly Pea Flowers (dark purple)
Dried Cornflower Petals (blue)
Dried Organic Rose Petals (reddish pink)
Dried Organic Young Rose Buds (bright pink)
Dried Safflower Petals (deep orange)
Dried Marigold Flowers (orange to yellow orange)
Dried Chrysanthemum Flowers (yellow)
Dried Jasmine Buds (white)

How to make Dried Wild Violet Sprinkles
This was our first spring on our homestead, and I was so happy to see violets come up all over the place!

You can pick them and dry them a thousand different ways, but I do have a few recommendations to make things as easy on yourself as possible…

1. Pick
Pick the stems close to the ground, leaving them nice and long. I chose not to wash my violets because I didn’t know if that would wilt or ruin them, and also, I like to live on the edge.

Please don’t pick violets from an area where chemical fertilizers or pesticides have been used.

Also note, do NOT use African Violets- those are something different and not edible.

2. Bundle
Bundle the violets together and use a twist tie to hold them together. I tried to keep the girth of the bundle of stems to about thumb size (so the middle flowers didn’t get too crowded and not dry).

Put the twist tie just above the middle of the stem (a little bit closer to the flower end). Very gently tighten it- if you’re too aggressive you’ll break a stem.

And there’s nothing I hate more than an aggressive twist-tier.

3. Dry
Take a string or whatever else you may find around the kitchen, and use the ends of the twist tie that are sticking out to secure the bundle to the hanging-device. I actually used a chain of rubber bands for this.

And then I hung them from my window latch. An errant nail or a drawer knob will do also. Basically, hang them up like you would when drying any other herb.

My violet bundles took about three days to completely dry.

If you want them done today, put them in a dehydrator for a few hours. I would NOT use an oven- it is too hot and you will likely bake the violets and turn them brown.

4. Flower Removal & Sprinkle Making
Once the violets are dry, you can store them as is with the stems still attached until you need them, or you can make them right into sprinkles.

Simply grasp the flower at its base where it meets the stem and pinch off the purple petals. You can pinch twice to make smaller sprinkles, or just once to make bigger confetti-like sprinkles. I did some of each. You can even grasp the flower a little farther down to get some of the green sepals in there as well. Whatever you like! It’s all edible.

You can also use a whole dried violet flower as a decoration, instead of making them into sprinkles.

Yield:
For the cupcakes you see in the picture, I used two flowers worth of petals for each one- just to give you some idea of what to expect. If you use the green part as well, I think you can get at least 25-30% more from each flower.

Expert Tips:
Just like with any sprinkles, put them on as soon as you frost the cake or cupcake. Once the frosting dries even a little bit, they won’t stick. Because these were so light-weight, I had to lightly touch them to the frosting to make them stick.

You can also use pink apple blossoms- they are edible, don’t have any strong taste and dry to a beautiful deep pink!! Pick the younger buds, before they are fully open, for the best color. I set mine out on a plate and in a few days they were dry.

And for natural green sprinkles, try my dried kale flakes!

Do you forage for edible flowers? What are some of your favorite uses for edible dried flowers?

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