My Top Ten Flowers for a Thriving and Beautiful Kitchen Garden

Growing flowers throughout the veggie patch is a key aspect of how I teach others to grow - by weaving different varieties of flowers amongst our edibles, we can create a resilient and diverse garden that has a healthy ecosystem teeming with wildlife and a balanced group of plants that all quietly work in harmony with each other.

Although I am often trying new flowers in my beds, there are a handful of beauties that I couldn’t be without, whether it is for their beneficial aspects or their willingness to be supportive companions for the edibles that sit next to them, or simply just their beauty. In no particular order, here are my top ten flowers for a thriving and beautiful kitchen garden.

Helenium "Moerheim Beauty"

Probably the prettiest summer and autumn flowers I grow in my vegetable garden is the burnt orange sunset-toned Helenium “Moerheim Beauty”. This stunning plant grows well in damp areas - not often the case for flowers - and the orangey red tones of the delicate petals have the appearance of being painted on. The flowers look impressive both before and during flowering, with the centers changing from being dark brown, hard and velvety, to becoming light, golden and pillowy as the flower matures.

Cosmos

I never quite feel like my summer veggie garden is complete until I have some wispy cosmos gently bouncing around in the breeze. The pretty tall plants are unintrusive, and will quite happily clamber up and through whatever is growing nearby to tower above everything as bee beacons. There are many colours to choose from so it is super easy to match your cosmos with whatever other flowers you already have growing.

Cosmos are extremely easy to grow from seed and you can begin sowing them in spring, not needing the same amount of warmth to germinate as many other annual flowers do.

Borage

In my mind, no edible garden would be complete without the blue (and sometimes white) star-shaped flowers of borage. However, it is the type of plant you need room for, as it grows quite tall, rather wide, and its roots are thick! But if you can find the space, it is one of the most beneficial flowers you can plant - especially on the corners of your beds where it won’t impinge on smaller plants.

Borage is deep-rooted, and these roots draw up nutrients - especially potassium - from way down in the soil, making them available for neighbouring plants or whatever follows on after. Since potassium is vital for fruiting crops like cucumbers, peppers, and tomatoes, these are a good choice to grow nearby. Borage leaves are also rich in potassium, and you can make a powerful plant food by soaking a pile of leaves in a bucket of water for a couple of weeks. When it is ready, dilute the liquid until it is the colour of weak tea and use it to water your fruiting vegetables.

One of the joys of borage is how profusely it flowers. The starry blooms appear in abundance, and bees absolutely adore them - often covering the plants from morning until evening. This makes borage a magnet for pollinators, boosting the productivity of everything growing around it.

Borage is also perfect for “chop and drop.” Cut it back, leave the roots to feed the soil, and use the leaves as mulch around bigger plants. Unlike comfrey, it won’t regrow from the roots. You can even treat it as a green manure, digging the whole plant into the soil before it flowers.

Borage self-seeds readily, which can mean it is sometimes labeled as a weed - but I don’t see it that way at all. The seedlings are easy to pull, and for such a generous plant that gives so much back, to me it is the opposite of a weed. Grow it from seed, or dig out a small seedling from a friend.

Calendula

Calendula flowers are traditionally vibrant and orange, but there are many varieties available to choose from, from dusky yellow through to deep maroon - although they all seem to have an orange tone behind them. I like to put these relatively compact plants along the edges of my beds where they do an excellent job of confusing pests and prettying up the garden.

Like marigolds, the smell of the flowers deters pests while attracting pollinators and beneficial predatory insects, and I have found them to be a valuable plant to grow with most vegetables. The robust plants bloom readily all year round, especially in winter when not much else is flowering, and they stand up well against wind, rain, and cold. They are also super easy to grow from seed (if flower seed growing is new to you, start with these), and they self-seed all over the place.

Calendula are technically short-lived perennials - and if they grow this way in yours you can just can them back once they get leggy to encourage new growth - but in most gardens they are treated as hardy annuals. With regular deadheading they will flower for a long season, and thanks to their habit of self-seeding, they’ll often reappear year after year as if they were true perennials.

Heliotrope

Also known as the “cherry pie plant,” heliotrope releases the sweetest scent when the sun warms its petals - and it really does smell like warm cherry pie. This delicate perennial has small lilac coloured flowers that draw many different pollinators in from all directions. Its low sprawling growth habit can be kept in check with frequent pruning, and then a deeper prune in late spring before the summer growth begins - note this is a tender plant so in colder climates it will be an annual. However, you can take cuttings in autumn which should root easily if kept in the right conditions, so you can easily ensure you have a supply coming on. The plant foliage doesn’t overshadow other plants; - instead it offers a beautiful low dappled light. I like to pair this purple flowering plant with orange toned calendulas and marigolds.

Mexican Sage

I love this furry vibrant salvia so much - it is easy to grow, and although it isn’t at all intrusive, it outgrow the weeds around it easily to bush out into a sizeable shrub that flowers profusely It also makes such as a good companion plant for edibles as it brings in varied pollinators and creates beautiful biodiversity. We are lucky in our climate because the tender plant doesn’t die down over winter, and I can grow it throughout the food forest year-round. It does well under fruit trees, alongside vegetables that need pollination, and in hard to grow areas where a beneficial filler is needed. The bushy shrub prefers sunshine and rich moisture retentive soil, but to be honest, I find it does well in most places, from dry rock gardens to swampy areas.

Cornflowers

Cornflowers are super easy to grow from seed and a wonderful companion for many vegetables. I like pairing mine with brassicas because they are a great deterrent for white butterfly, so get into the habit of sprinkling seeds all around the outskirts of your brassicas if the weather is favourable.

Rudbeckia

I only grow one type of rudbeckia, but it is a simply divine variety (name unknown). The chocolate centered dusky gold and browny-orange flowers were originally grown from seeds given to me from a friend. Rudbeckia does need warm weather to germinate - I don’t start mine until early summer - but once you have the flowers (which are actually from the sunflower family) you can easily collect more seeds for the following year. The cone seed heads come to fruition during the dry months of autumn which makes for easy seed collection. Butterflies, bees and a myriad of summer insects enjoy visiting rudbeckia, making them a wonderful companion for the vegetable garden.

Marigolds

Marigolds just have to go under my tomatoes, and so I grow quite a few from seed every year. As eluded to, they are a traditional summer companion plant in the veggie patch for fruiters like tomatoes, peppers, and aubergines, but really all vegetables benefit from their many qualities. They offer protection to other plants both above and below the soil; underground, their roots release natural compounds that suppress harmful nematodes, while above ground, the pungent smell of their flowers confuses and deters pests like aphids and harmful beetles.

There are many varieties from lower growing compact marigolds to sprawling ones or even robust tall ones; personally I like “Honeycomb” (pictured) with a mix of larger varieties, especially the pure orange Indian vibed “Kees Orange”. I actually think my varieties have cross pollinated, because now my honeycomb marigolds grow tall, which is fine by me as they are far more robust than they used to be. Marigolds prefer warmth and sun so wait until the weather is favourable to sow seeds. Deadhead flowers to encourage more, then once flowering is done let the seeds dry on the plant for replanting next summer.

Sweet Alyssum

Last but not least is the wonderful Sweet Alyssum. This unintrusive slow growing ground cover is perfect for growing on the garden edges and throughout the veggie patch. The tiny flowers are fodder for butterflies, bees, ladybug, hoverflies and many other aphid eating beneficial insects, all of which can feed off or live in the soft groundcover carpet it provides. The annual is easy to grow from seed, so sprinkle it onto any bare soil edges once the weather has warmed up and keep it well watered while it is germinating.