Five chefs who are exploring the potential of plants in their desserts

Nature is limitless. Its resources are endless and are there for us to use, always in a responsible and sustainable way. Understanding the importance of plants, leaves, and herbs throughout our history allows us to appreciate their relevance, and even the necessity of including them in our pantry.

Without a doubt, they are ingredients that allow pastry chefs to expand their range of flavors and enhance their connection with their surroundings.

Here we highlight five chefs who have been able to identify and make the most of plants in their pastry creations.

Masanori Hata. Helping the Noto Peninsula Recover from the Earthquake

Masanori Hata was part of the Japanese team that won the 2025 Coupe du Monde de la Pâtisserie with works based on the concept of “Land of the Rising Sun,” using traditional Japanese items such as Kabuki or Asa-no-ha (hemp leaf) patterns.

Besides this iconic motif, Hata incorporated lemon marigolds into the Miyabi dessert, published in so good.. magazine 34. The herb grows in an area designated as a World Agricultural Heritage site in the Noto Peninsula. It is not a very popular species, but its lemon-like aroma is so intense that you can easily imagine it matching with any citrus fruit. “I wanted to use it because of its unique aroma, but moreover, the area where the herb was grown was hit by a devastating earthquake on New Year’s Day 2024, and using it in the international competition would be a way of wishing for the recovery from the disaster.”

In the competition, he brought a distiller to deliver a fresh lemon marigold aroma to the judges. Distilling is a technique that he learned through craft gin making at Tatsumi Distillery in his hometown of Gifu prefecture, and it will be part of his pastry making in the future.

Discover the recipe in so good #34

Blanca del Noval. Wild Pantry

During her time at the BCulinary Lab, a research team at the Basque Culinary Center in San Sebastián (Spain), Blanca del Noval focused her attention on the forgotten potential of wild plants, even co-writing the book, Silvestre. “The use of wild edible plants is not only a culinary issue, but also a cultural, identity, and health issue, promoting biodiversity in our diet and environment and, ultimately, improving our relationship with nature,” she argues.

In the world of sweets, wild plants are an opportunity to explore new registers, where the incorporation of bitter, acidic, spicy, and aromatic components is key to achieving creations with balanced sweetness. Just look at the proposals she presents in so good.. magazine 30, such as Sorrel, crème fraîche, and fir ice cream cake. “In this case, I was looking for a fresher dessert, in which the acidity of the three ice creams would stand out. Each of the ice creams has a different acidity: citric (sorrel), acetic (fir), and lactic (crème fraîche). I added elm to the cookie because it offers more pronounced licorice notes, perfect for balancing and giving personality to the crunch.”

Discover the recipe in so good #30

Francisco Moreira. Beyond mint and thyme

After starting to collaborate with Cécile, owner of Tiers Paysage, a tiny, one-woman business dedicated to the production and wild harvesting of flowers and plants in small areas, Francisco Moreira realized that walnut trees have leaves, and that these are more than just interesting for patisserie uses.

The director of the Chocolate Academy in Brussels presents in so good.. magazine 34 a surprising project, Herbarium Collection, in which he invites you to discover the potential of plants in pastry beyond mint, rosemary, and thyme. Leaves that taste of vanilla and aniseed, roots that smell of tonka bean, flowers that recall the taste of pineapple…

In these creations he presents the variety of plant or flower used in each case on the surface of the cake, as if it were inserted into a book. Hence the chocolate plaques with slightly bent tips. And to make each flower shine, he used the crystallization technique, which also adds a new crispy caramel texture.

Discover the recipe in so good #34

Mineko Kato preserves the satoyama landscape

At FARO, an innovative Italian restaurant that sits on the 10th floor of the Tokyo Ginza Shiseido Building, some customers cry when trying Satoyama tart of flowers made with a plant-based dough topped with a plant-based vanilla pastry cream and filled with 30 to 40 different herbs and flowers, as its aroma evokes childhood memories.

This cake represents Mineko Kato‘s aspiration that satoyama will continue to thrive more than 50 years from now. Satoyama, the border between highly natural forests and mountains (yama) and human settlements (sato), provides natural environments such as farmlands, grasslands, and reservoirs humans have created over the years. It has not only nourished biodiversity but has also developed culture through human contact with nature. ‘The flowers and grasses used in the tarts are sent to us by farmers from all over Japan who have picked them from the satoyama. Many of these farmers are elderly, in their 70s and 80s, and I fear that if they disappear, the satoyama will also disappear,’ she states in so good.. magazine 30.

Discover the recipe in so good #30

Francisco Migoya. “Simplissimus” Method

With sustainability in mind, Francisco Migoya has imposed a working method dubbed “Simplissimus,” which consists of using no more than three ingredients in a dessert. Not three components. Three ingredients (salt, sugar, and water are not considered part of the three-ingredient total equation).

As an unbeatable example, Migoya shares his Hoja Santa, which appears on the cover and contains only root beer leaves, heavy cream, and vanilla, in so good.. magazine 29.

“This dessert uses a very peculiar leaf that is known as root beer leaf in English but its original name is Hoja Santa (holy leaf) in Spanish. It is a large green leaf that does in fact taste like root beer. This is the main reason for creating a dessert inspired by the classic soda fountain drink which is a scoop of vanilla ice cream served atop a glass filled with root beer. To me, this is a fantastic combination. I am not sure why but I was surprised that I liked this version so much, even though all of its components are almost entirely different from each other. The recipe calls for a freeze dryer, and unfortunately there is no other way to make it in the exact same way.”

Discover the recipe in so good #29