Why Grow Your Own Plants?
August in the garden is kind of wild and unkempt. Every plant is rushing to pass on their genetics and make new seeds, to grow as fast as possible before the cold sets in. This is wonderful for harvest time! It means everything is finishing up and ripening in abundance. Luckily, some plants are later to the finish line than others, like winter squash, apples, drying beans. Others like herbs and tomatoes need to be harvested as often as possible.
I feel like I have been harvesting herbs every 3-4 days for the last two months. As I was harvesting chammoile recently, I started to think about why I might grow my own plants, beside all the obvious reasons.
I grow my own herbs, fruits, vegetables and flowers because there are so many varieties out there that are not used by the food industry, but are so worth it. I’m growing three different kinds of lavender to see what type grows best here and is the most aromatic versus showy when dried. I have 5 kinds of thyme because I like the way they taste in different dishes. One of my favorite peppers “sweat heat” cannot be found in grocery stores. I love this pepper because it’s a surprise every time, whether it will be incredibly hot or totally mild. The flavor is fantastic and I plan to make fermented hot sauce from it this year.
The tomatoes above are a variety that is no longer breed or sold. I keep it going via cuttings. They are my favorite for canning tomato sauce.
Below is a picture of the small herb garden. It’s really wild right now and I love it. I can’t imagine send someone in here to “get an herb for me” without good knowledge of what they were collecting. There are 30-40 different plants in here.
If you are interested in growing herbs and flowers for medicinal purposes, you’ll absolutely want to start growing your own varieties. Herbs are especially important to grow on your own if you can, so you have control over the plant source. Something like gotu kola is a water plant that grows most often in irrigation ditches in India. That’s something I don’t necessarily want to buy wild harvested as I don’t really know about the water source or the soil. Growing my own means I know exactly where it’s coming from and what is going into the care of that plant. Make sure to do your research about where your supplements come from!
My favorite herbal seed company is Strictly Medicinal Seeds. They have the best collection of medicinal seeds out there.
Cold Mallow and Violet Tea
The month of August is a hard time in Utah, it’s often very dry and windy with no rain in sight. Until this week we had humidity levels of 10% or less. But now a front has moved in that raised to humidity up to 20-30%. What a difference. My skin feels so much better. I know it won’t last but it feels so good. Before I end this post I wanted to share a really easy moistening herbal water that created. All it takes are some fresh mallow leaves and some violets or borage flowers if you have them.
Ingredients:
16 oz of cool water in a glass or jar
3-4 fresh mallow officinalis leaves
2-3 violet or borage flowers or both
Method:
Tear up the leaves into small pieces and add them to the glass. Add the flowers and the water. Allow to sit at least 15 minutes. You can leave it for a few hours too if you forget. By letting it sit for a while you are letting the natural mucilage come out of the leaves and infuse into the water. Unlike mallow root, the leaves don’t become gloopy. The water has a mouth feel of being just slightly thicker. I found this really refreshing on the driest days when just water wasn’t enough to keep my mucosal lining happy.
If you don’t have mallow growing near by but can find it’s wild cousin malva neglecta you could use those leaves too. Young plantain leaves would work in pinch as well. The flowers are cooling and add a slight cucumber flavor to the water.
I’ve also tried this with calendula petals and that lovely too, very mild.
Do you live in a low humidity area? Have you ever tried mallow leaves? Leave me a comment below!
