Alba

'Alba' is the white-flowered form of common borage, sold as Borago officinalis 'Alba' and treated in catalogs as a scarcity beside the ubiquitous blue type. Territorial Seed calls the ivory blooms a rare white variant, and Select Seeds lists it as an heirloom annual whose nodding stars open pure white rather than cornflower blue. Nothing about its kitchen value changes -- leaves and flowers still carry the cool cucumber note borage is grown for -- but white reads completely differently in a bed, a salad, or frozen into an ice cube. Gardeners choose it when they want borage's heavy bee traffic and edible garnish without the blue, or when blue would fight the rest of a planting. Like the ordinary form it self-sows, so one deliberate sowing usually becomes a permanent if wandering resident.