Chrysanthemum

The petal is all bitterness and hay. Honey is the standard-issue correction.

Rock sugar dissolves slowly, so the bitterness arrives before the sweetness does.

Catechin bitterness and petal bitterness are different enough to read as depth.

Cooling on cooling by Chinese logic, and the fruit sugar buries the straw note.

Dried sweetness in the pot is the classic fix; the flower gives it something to cut.

Heat under a cold-natured flower. The gingerol keeps the cup from tasting medicinal.

Glycyrrhizin is fifty times sweeter than sugar and it lands under bitterness perfectly.

Same fortnight of autumn in Jiangnan. Bitter petal against sweet roe, then hot vinegar.

Petals thrown into the hotpot broth; the bitterness cuts fat with no acid involved.

Petals and strands, both bitter-green. A nabe garnish that earns its place.

Bland curd takes bitterness as flavour rather than as a fault. Nothing else is happening.

Acid strips the camphor edge and leaves the honeyed half of the petal standing.

Botanical bitterness meeting botanical bitterness; the flower reads as an extra root.