Many years back I planted a rose geranium plant (Pelargonium graveolens) and was close to pulling it out. The leaves had that interesting rosy, grassy rose-geranium scent, true enough, but the plant was sprawling, leggy, and in its underwatered spot looked nice only a couple months a year.

What gave it a reprieve was the recipe in the Chez Panisse Desserts cookbook for rose geranium pound cake, a delicate, subtle cloud of a dessert where even a tiny slice kept you captivated with its hard-to-guess source of flavor. And the little ruffled leaves that you baked into the top of the cake were an awesome decoration.

The kitchen remodel a couple years ago involved a bulldozer in the garden–usually not good news for the plants under its treads. The original rose geranium got squashed and dug up, and its original home is now a slab of concrete in the dining area. (Check out the funny description at Las Pilitas nursery for Penstemon Margarita B.O.P., a really cool plant that suffered a similar fate, though fortunately not until after it had been propagated. I never knew what the “B.O.P.” stood for until I read the note.)

Last weekend I finally bought a replacement. The small plant looked identical to what I’d grown before, but this one had a different species name on the label, G. capitatum ‘Attar of Roses.’ The Dave’s Garden writeup shows bigger, almost ivy-geranium-sized flowers on the plant, and the description puts it at half the size of what I had before. And the scented geranium list at Herbalpedia says there are at least 50 geraniums that have a rose scent.

Based on what I’ve seen from the plant, however, I’m skeptical that my plant is much different from the previous one. I’m not taking chances. It went into the ground where it’ll be screened by a few other herbs.

Here’s the recipe in case you get motivated. Also check out the Herbalpedia list above where you’ll find sixteen other recipes, plus lots more ideas of what to do with scented geraniums.

15-18 small rose geranium leaves
1 1/4 cups unsalted butter, softened
1 1/3 cups sugar
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon rose water
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon Cognac
6 eggs
1/8 teaspoon mace
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
2 2/3 cups unsifted cake flour

Butter and flour a 9-inch springform pan or a 10-inch bundt or tube pan. Rinse and dry the rose geranium leaves and arrange a dozen of the in a ring around the bottom fo the pan, undersides up. Arrange the rest in the center.

Cream the butter until very light and fluffy. Beat in the sugar and continue beating until the mixture is fluffy again. Beat in the vanilla, rose water, and Cognac. Add the eggs one by one, beating to incorporate each one thoroughly before adding the next one. Beat until the mixture is smooth. Mix the mace, salt and cream of tartar into the flour and sift the flour over the butter mixture in four portions, beating just until each one is mixed in. Carefully spoon some of the batter into the pan to anchor the leaves in place. Pour the rest of the batter into the pan and smooth it. Tap the pan on the counter to force out any air bubbles.

Bake in the center of a preheated 325 degree oven for about an hour and a quarter, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool. Turn out of the pan and optionally dust lightly with powdered sugar that’s been stored with a vanilla bean. (I like it just fine without this step.)