I won’t use fondant. Would make my teeth hurt.
How about fresh flowers on cakes? Just make sure they haven’t been exposed to pesticides. And of course are non-toxic, which should go without saying, but maybe it doesn’t. Some people say you shouldn’t put anything on a cake you wouldn’t eat, but you don’t eat candles. And some people don’t eat fondant.
You can dip small flowers in egg white and then sugar. Violets, pansies, borage, calendula, nasturtium, pea or bean, roses, cornflower (Centaura), daylily and fuchsia are all edible. Some species of dianthus are also.
Sweetpea is not edible!
My mother’s birthday is at the end of May. I usually make her a cake with roses, and we often have violets on an Easter cake.
I love the concept and look of candied flowers on cakes; I just don’t like the taste.
Last year, a friend from India came back from travels with ‘Turkish Delight’; we were intrigued, because we’d seen so many references to it in old English stories. But it was horrible! - it was made with rosewater, and tasted exactly like eating a rose.
Maybe violets are different - but that Turkish Delight sorta queered me on eating flower-stuff ;-)
-JT