Although most gardeners take pride in the beauty of their flowers, they should also appreciate their flavour, according to experts.

There are more than 100 different plants in the UK that have edible flowers, according to Gardening Which?

Researchers looked at 37 flowers in particular which they found to be useful cooking ingredients.

Some examples included the Alaska Salmon Orange variety of nasturtium, which has a peppery flavour so is ideal to add to salads, yellow varieties of pot marigold, whose saffron colour is perfect for rice and soup and the flowers of the lemon variety of basil, which can be added to pasta dishes.

Gardening Which? editor Ceri Thomas said: "Keen cooks and gardeners alike have got used to popping out to their garden to get some mint or thyme to add to their dinner, but everyone should consider adding flowers to their ingredients both for flavouring and decoration.

"It was great to see so many varieties in our tests that successfully cross over from beautiful in the borders to tasty on the dining room table. I'll definitely be adding a bit of zest to my tea from now on."

For planting advice, visit Planting Up.