One of my favorite topics! Herbs to grow, eat, and use in the home.
When you brush their leaves, sesame plants smell like toasty, uber-fresh sesame seeds. They really do!
I would not have known that were I not attempting to grow my own sesame seed crop this year. My experiment may never result in a real crop, but it is already gleaning all sorts of fascinating new discoveries. I think that counts as a success. Everything from here on out is a bonus.
What did you learn in the garden today?
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This little rosemary is ‘Blue Boy’ a compact variety that grows into interesting no-work bonsai shapes in a pot. I originally purchased several of these as table decoration and parting gifts for people who attended the Grow Great Grub book launch party back in February. I even took one home myself. And then I lost it. I have absolutely no idea what happened to that plant. It just disappeared. By then I had fallen in love with this little plant, so I bought another.
The plant in this picture is ‘Blue Boy 2: The Sequel” and miracle of miracles it didn’t up and walk away. It even made it here to the new house. So far so good.
As of today it is still outside, up against the house where it gains some warmth from the brick. This is unusual for my part of the world. I always leave my rosemary plants outside until just after a hard frost, but then I bring them in for the winter. I learned this secret to their success on my first trip to Portland, Oregon. I’ve been twice, both times in the month of February when it is cold, wet and blah. Rosemary grows very, very well in Portland. It’s not unusual to see plants that have grown into massive bushes and hedges.
Since those trips I take my cue as to when to bring my rosemary indoors based on how cold and wet it was there. Rosemary does not like how dry and warm it gets inside our homes during the winter months. Keeping them happily hydrated can be a struggle. As long as they seem happy, I try to leave my plants outside until the last possible minute, because once they come indoors it’s a bit of a production to keep them going until spring.
So far fall in Toronto has been relatively mild. I went out this morning after the rain to check on my remaining potted plants that are still outdoors (and shoo away digging squirrels). It felt a lot like Portland on those February trips. Even my calendula is still going and is about to bust out another bloom!
This year I have also been gifted with an unheated sunporch that is doubling as a cold greenhouse. I could put my rosemary in there and be done with it, but I’m keeping this one outside as an experiment to see what I can get away with. Although, come to think of it, I should be experimenting with the average rosemary plant and keeping the special one in the safer, protected spot.
I think I’ll go do that right now. Things are good right now, but I don’t want to have to go back for ‘Blue Boy 3: The Reckoning’ should the weather take a turn for the worse.
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Thanksgiving weekend has just passed in Canada, and even though I’m not big on the holiday, the one thing I do demand is a homemade pumpkin pie. Fortunately, we made a pumpkin this year. Accidentally.
Here’s how it happened. Back in the late spring, a friend gave us some unmarked transplants for the Yardshare Garden. A few of them were squashes, but at that size we could not yet tell if they were bushes or vines. We didn’t have any full sun spaces left, so we tucked one into a slightly less than sunny spot near the back of the garden. It wasn’t the best spot, and we knew it wasn’t the best spot, but we planted it anyways. I thought it still had a shot and felt it was worth the experiment to see what would happen when the growing conditions aren’t perfect, but not too far off of the mark either. I’ve learned a lot experimenting in this way. Probably more than I’ve learned doing things the right way. Some edible plants surprise you: they turn out nicely but their yield is lower. Others are just too unhealthy and succumb to diseases and pests they might be more resistant to in better conditions.
When we planted the squash, I assumed it was a bushing zucchini. It wasn’t.
And so it grew and grew rather quickly as winter squashes often do. And when it was threatening to take over the yard, I brought over a freestanding trellis I had woven from green branches in the early spring and we wound it up and off of the ground.
It looked pretty good for an unexpected plant stuck in the wrong space. We were all surprised when the plant grew a pumpkin and the critters that visit the garden didn’t get it. I’ve grown pumpkins (intentionally) several times, but keeping them going in community garden spaces that are overrun by mammalian critters is difficult. The trick is to find ways to protect the fruit when you aren’t there, which is most of the time. City critters are smart — they always break through my defences. Yet, here we were with a pumpkin that we didn’t intend to grow, had put in the wrong spot, and had made little effort to protect. Go pumpkin!
Unfortunately, it was a strange summer. It was unbearably hot and dry for weeks, then raining, raining, raining. Not the best conditions for a squash plant that was not in the sunniest spot in the garden. The plant quickly turned the corner from nice to unsaveable in the bat of an eye. Fortunately, by then the lone pumpkin had turned orange and was very near mature. Eventually the plant died back entirely and the pumpkin fell off of its own accord.
Here it is.
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Beautiful Tricolor Sage.
My tenth and last Globe & Mail Kitchen Gardening article for the 2010 growing season is set to be published this coming Saturday. It is on growing and eating cardoons, an Italian delicacy that I experimented with this year.
Until then, here’s a timely piece that was published in the Saturday paper on August 27, 2010. Even though the hardy garden sage begins producing leaves very early in the growing season, I most associate its warm aroma with the fall. Sage and squash is a classic combination. I suggest steeping some in oil to drizzle on top of warm squash soup or mash. Bloody good stuff.
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Warm and pungent, common garden sage is a classic culinary herb most associated with the flavours of the fall harvest – and now is a great time to plant it. Get yourself a year-old transplant on discount at an end-of-season sale and you should have a small bounty just in time to add to Thanksgiving stuffing, steep in lightly warmed olive oil or drizzle on top of a hearty squash soup.
The sage family is huge, but only a few are edible and even fewer still are cold-hardy enough to survive winter across most of Canada. Like other Mediterranean herbs, they like a sunny spot in the garden and prefer poor, dry soil that drains freely. Keeping their “feet” or roots from stagnating in moist soil is the secret to keeping them alive year-round, especially in climates considered slightly out of their zone. Another trick is to plant sage in the shelter of a warm wall, where it will have the greatest chance of survival.
Whatever you do, resist the urge to fertilize at planting time – or at any time for that matter. Culinary sages grown in rich soil tend to lose their spicy edge and can turn out rather bland leaves that are too “soft” and pest-prone. Otherwise they’re a pretty foolproof plant. My biggest hurdle each year is a mid-summer bout of a fungal disease called powdery mildew that is caused by high humidity around the leaves. Well-draining soil will go a long way to prevention, but, since you can’t control the weather, try plucking out excess foliage (and eating it, too) to increase airflow.
The most common variety (Salvia officinalis) is also the toughest of the bunch. Don’t prune it now. Wait until early spring and cut into the green growth only – never go into the woody stems. At its worst, hard pruning can kill the plant or at least prevent it from flowering – and the edible, slightly sweet flowers are one of the best reasons for growing your own. Toss a few into a spring salad or chop them up and infuse into softened butter or vinegar.
Beyond the common type, the remaining culinary sages won’t live past a year in most Canadian gardens, but are still well worth growing for their unique foliage and varied flavours. ‘Berggarten‘ tastes a lot like common sage but is much prettier, with very broad, oval leaves and a low, densely compact growth habit. ‘Purpurascens,’ ‘Tricolor‘ and ‘Golden’ a.k.a. ‘Aurea’ are the best choice for containers, as they stay compact and adapt well to cramped quarters. In fact, you can even bring one indoors to overwinter on a sunny windowsill for fresh sage year-round.
For something even more unusual, try growing a tropical sage such as ‘Pineapple’ (Salvia elegans) or ‘Fruit’ sage (Salvia dorsiana). Both grow edible, sticky leaves and bold flowers with a fruity, sweet taste that is most often used to make tea or garnish desserts. I’m currently hot on Autumn sage (Salvia greggii), a southwestern salvia that produces delectable, nectar-filled flowers in a wide range of interesting colours from subtle peach to hot pink and the deepest, darkest burgundy. I find the highly aromatic leaves are too bitter to eat, but so delicious to run your hands over on a grey winter day when you can use a boost in spirit and a reminder of the spring to come.
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I’m way behind on posting past articles from my Globe & Mail column. This profile of thyme was published on July 19, 2010. I thought I’d go with it first since the article set to be published this coming Saturday is a profile of another favourite garden herb: sage.
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Most of the country, including Toronto, has just now survived a heat wave. It was hot, especially out on the roof garden, my little piece of heaven turned to hell by the scorching sun. It was only inhabitable after dark – we spent the week offering emergency critical plant care by flashlight.
In that heat, some containers required watering three times per day! The lettuces, violas (miraculously still alive), and even typically resilient basil and tomatoes growing in larger pots put up a fuss of dramatic fainting, fretting, and impromptu wilting when the heat was at its worst. My once lush and healthy lemon tree mysteriously dropped all of its leaves on one side. But trusty, tough-as-nails thyme never once complained. I simply shifted a few pots into slightly less intense sun and it was business as usual.
For a tiny plant, thyme has got it all – looks, an easy going nature, a deliciously warm aroma, a pungent, complicated flavour, and it makes an impact in a cramped space. It is one of only a few edibles that can survive a full growing season in the 4” transplant pot it came home in. In fact, thyme will grow just about anywhere and in anything. In the wild, thyme grows among rocks in very free-draining and poor, often sandy soil.
It’s a very hardy plant that can survive a cold zone 4 winter, as long as the soil is not dense or soggy. I inexplicably lost several plants in my community garden’s premium soil, until I finally hit on the key – thyme simply will not tolerant life in wet soil through a wet winter. This plant doesn’t do nutrient rich, gorgeous soil well. To keep it alive, add lots of rock, sand or grit to increase your soil drainage in-ground. I recently visited a garden filled with happy thyme, all grown directly on top of driveway gravel!
Soil drainage is generally easier to achieve in pots. Most thyme varieties will adapt to pots too small or difficult for anything but cacti and succulents as long as there are lots of holes for water to flow straight out. Potted plants won’t survive outside year-round throughout most parts of Canada but a little pot in a sunny window can provide some fresh greenery here and there until it is warm enough to go back out in the early spring. Otherwise it is new transplants each year. Don’t bother growing from seed unless you intend to grow a lot of any one variety.
Speaking of variety, thyme is an incredibly versatile herb and far beyond the woody and pungent common type (Thymus vulgaris) available at most grocery stores. I’ve got about 12 varieties in a surprising breadth of flavours, smells, colours, and growth forms growing on my roof right now, yet my collection if far from complete.
Next to the common English thyme, deliciously fragrant lemon and lime citrus types (Thymus x citrodorus) are probably most popular and widely available in garden shops and corner markets. There are several varieties that qualify in this category – they come in shades of green, gold, variegated gold ‘Aureus’, and variegated silver ‘Silver Lemon Queen’. ‘Doone Valley’ is very low growing, with round, green leaves spattered with pale gold and cream. ‘Orange Balsam’ and ‘Orange Spice’ have a sweet and spicy orange peel smell and pointy leaves that strike me as a bit conifer-like.
Next up are the creepers: Mother-of-thyme (Thymus serphyllum), Thymus ‘Coccineus’, and woolly thyme (Thymus psuedolanuginosus). They aren’t particularly edible, but they make an aromatic, drought tolerant lawn alternative that you can actually walk on. There are also very diminutive types that form a soft, plush carpet over and between cracks in cement and stone walls. If you’re going to go this route, be sure to grow several varieties together so that you have different textures, smells, and flower colours in bloom together and at varying intervals.
The most compelling are the mimics; thyme plants that smell convincingly like other herbs. I’m currently growing ‘Lavender’, ‘Nutmeg’, ‘Oregano’, ‘Caraway’ (Thymus herba-barona), and ‘Rose Petal’. While I am still finding culinary uses for some of the more unusual flavours, I’ve found that all types seem to pair well with onions. Roast a couple of summer onions in the oven along with thyme leaves and stems, and a splash of olive oil. Don’t forget to dry a few sprigs at the season’s end so you can enjoy this warming dish through the winter.
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