Culinary herbs like marjoram, sure. You can always experiment with using the herb with flowers, without flowers, before it flowers, and after it flowers. Some plants taste different at different parts of their life cycle. As long as the herb is something that is a pretty common edible, go for it.

Medicinal herbs, on the other hand, I'd look those ones up. Only specific parts of medicinal herbs are used. Get a good herb reference that notes the parts of the plant used. If it says "whole herb" or "aerial parts" or something akin to that for the parts used, then flowers are generally included. If it says only leaves, then only leaves are used.

I hope this helps!

FataMorgana

Thanks for the response. These are culinary- Italian, Greek , and White Oregano. Wild basil, lemon thyme, and sage have not yet flowered.

John

The flowers of most of the popular culinary herbs are edible. Sometimes it can be a PITA to separate off the flowers, especially when they are tiny, like those of thyme, savory, rosemary, rocket, coriander etc. Might as well dry those along with the leaves.

I have a number of recipes which call for only the flowers of such herbs to be used - in which case you can spend several hours plucking them off and drying them separately. Frankly, I couldn't be bothered!

For medicinal purposes, if the remedy requires flowers, then they should be separated from the leaves. If the remedy requires 'flowering tops' then the top leaves and flowers can be dried together. Same if the remedy requires 'aerial parts' - these being all parts above the ground.

So - in brief. Don't worry too much about the flowers, if they belong to the popular culinary herbs. But for medicinal purposes, make sure to use ONLY the parts of the plant that a remedy calls for.

If in doubt - ask here about specific plants. Yes, oregano flowers are edible, so are basil flowers, thyme flowers and the flowers of the common or garden sage Salvia officinalis (NOT all sages, though!).

Thanks--I've got several batches dried now

john