Holiday gifts to share from your herb garden
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Anne-Marie Walker
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Cheery Calendula is in the foreground with Salvia Hot Lips in the background. Photo: Dorothy Weaver
Annual herbs, those grown in a single season, must be planted yearly. Three annuals I grew this summer are Calendula officinalis (calendula), Tropaeolum majus (nasturtiums), and Anthriscus cerefolium (chervil). Calendula is easily sown from seed flowering in two months. Harvest and dry the flowers and place them in a jar. Fill the jar with olive oil. After about two months, you have an oil infused with calendula; its healing properties help boost cell growth. To make soothing Calendula Lotion, strain the oil and mix it with a hypo-allergenic cream, ratio of 1 cup of lotion to ¼ c of calendula oil.
Nasturtium is in bloom prior to seeds developing in a pollinated ovary inside the flower. Photo: David WalkerMy french grandfather taught me at an early age to grow chervil, a delicate herb not sold in stores. In France, it is grown in large rows, harvested frequently, and mixed into salads or made into herb butter or chutney. Sometimes called French Parsley, chefs have included chervil in many of the best-tasting Bay Area restaurant salads. Delight friends with a seed packet, a chervil start, or chervil chutney.
Gifts made from the herb harvest are ready to delight recipients this holiday season. Photo: Anne-Marie WalkerPerennial herbs in the mint family, including Agastache foeniculum (Anise Hyssop), are delicious sugared as a candy confection or incorporated into a dried mix of lemon-scented herbs for herbal tea blends. Just as the essence of an herb can be extracted in olive oil, so can the herb impart flavor to alcohol and vinegars. I know someone who fills a bottle with the leaves of Anise hyssop and a good neutral gin. This is his secret for a good martini.
As you share these herbal gifts, remember you have helped your garden become sustainable. The bees, butterflies, hummingbirds, and other beneficial insects have sipped the nectar and collected the pollen. Many herbs have low water requirements and bring biodiverse benefits to gardens. Wishing happy, herby holidays to all.