Are there any culinary herbs that you should NOT be pinching the flowers off of?

The herbs that I will usually remove the flowers from are annuals, as annuals will focus all their energy on seed production and then die. Your annual herbs (basil, cilantro for example) will last MUCH longer if you pinch out the flowers to delay flowering.

I let most of my perennial herbs flower (rosemary, oregano, savory, etc) - I enjoy the flowers, they are edible as well, are beautiful and attract pollinators.

Herb flowers are also wonderful to use for fragrant boquets or posies and beautiful as garnishes or in salads. Also lovely to garnish beverages and cocktails with a few edible flowers.

I especially love basil flowers and tend to plant LOTS of basil, I like to buy it in six packs and usually am planting as many kinds as I can find. Right now the basil is finally hitting the nurseries in my area and I was able to buy 5 different kinds last week. I interplant these with tomatoes and other vegetables in the big garden and keep plenty of pots of herbs in the yard close to the house for kitchen use. I will pick the flowering stems for small bouquets or garnishes regularly. As I am mostly cooking with Italian or lemon or cinnamon basils, the others I use for decoration and their fragrance. I will often leave the flowers on the others (and on some of my cooking ones as well) til the stems are long enough to cut for larger bouquets.

For bouquets at the dinner table I very much prefer herb boquets to very fragrant flowers like lilies, roses, freesias, etc as the herb aromas complement the meal while very fragrant flowers (or scented candles) will compete with the aromas of the meal.

So...if your perennial herbs are flowering, enjoy the show. If it’s your annuals, you can use the flowers you trim away for seasoning and decoration.

I had a friend for dinner last night. Our salad included butter lettuce and mizuna leaves, arugula leaves and flowers and buds, kale flowers and buds, nasturtium leaves and flowers (a very small amount, nasturtiums are strongly flavored) and shisu and basil leaves, all from my garden. If I had had any basil flowers, I would have included them. (The salad also had grated carrot, thinly sliced green onion, toasted pistachio nuts and Annies Goddess dressing - this is one of my favorite salads). Ah, and I also sprinkled in a pinch or so of lemon thyme leaves stripped from the stems and lightly squeezed to activate their aroma.

And on the table is a large boquet of kale flowers (those stems are about 30” long) nasurtium leaves and flowers, arugula flowers and a couple sprigs of sweet pea.

On the kitchen counter is a large boquet of lacey and delicate cilantro flowers.

Why do you post inappropriate things on my page relating to fellatio? Please, do not do that. It is unkind and in poor taste.

You're not supposed to let them flower, especially not this early in the season.   They flower, produce a seed, then die.