Herbs and Flowers – Page 3 – John's Random Thoughts and Discussions

Spring is on the Way

It would probably be hard for most people to accept the fact that spring is on the way, especially when they look outside on a snowbound day like this one:

However, the fact of the matter is that spring really is on the way. It’s going to be an early spring, in fact. There are several things that tell me this. First, and possibly most important, the tree sap is starting to run again. In fact, the people around here who tap maple trees to make syrup have already done so, which is extremely early. I noticed that the trees in the woods also have sap running in them—at least the ones in our woods. I’ve never seen the sap run this early. (My uncle, who has lived a few years more than I have, says he has seen spring arrive this early in the past, but he wasn’t quite sure when, which tells me it was quite some time ago.)

Anyone who lives in the north will tell you that the air takes on a different quality in the spring. It has a different odor to it, or perhaps a different texture. I have yet to find a good way to quantify the difference, but the difference is unmistakeable. You take a good deep whiff and the air simply doesn’t quite smell like winter anymore. Perhaps there is the faintest hint of fresh greenery or some other element that looms at the horizon of human perception—present, but hard to identify. I smell it every spring and every spring I fail to pin down precisely what has changed.

Of course, most people want something a little more substantial than tree sap and odd smells, so there is also the birds to consider. When we were trimming the trees the other day, we definitely noticed the springtime songs of birds. No, it’s not the wild kingdom effect—the raucous early morning expenditure of energy that birds have later in the spring, but it’s a gentler prelude, as if the symphony is about to begin.

There are going to be other signs. None of my flowers have started bursting through the soil as of yet. The buds on the trees are still shut tightly as well. However, it won’t be long and I’ll start to see bud swell, and then, one day I’ll look at my flower bed and see just an inkling of the springtime flowers peaking through to see if the coast is clear. Spring is most definitely on the way—the signs are all around for anyone who wants to look. What are your favorite indicators of spring? Let me know at [email protected].

Contemplating the Hardiness Zone Changes

Just in case you weren’t aware of it, the USDA has recently changes the hardiness zones for the United States. The hardiness zones help you understand what will grow in your area. Certain plants require warmer temperatures in order to grow and others require cooler temperatures. For example, if you want peaches, you need to be in a warmer zone. Our area has changed from 4B to 4A, which means that some types of trees that I couldn’t grow in the past will likely grow now. You can see an animation of how the hardiness zones have changed on the Arbor Day Foundation site.

Most people would agree that changes of this sort make global warming undeniable. Of course, it’s a misconception to strictly say that the effect is global warming, which is a misnomer. Yes, the planet has warmed up some, but a more correct assessment is that the weather is going to become increasingly chaotic. The point of this post is not to drag you into a discussion of precisely how global warming will affect the planet, what generalizations we can make about it, whether our scientists can define any long term trends about it, or anything of that sort. I’ll leave the discussion of how much man has contributed toward global warming to those with the credentials to make such statements. The point is that last year I was in Zone 4B and now I’m in Zone 4A. The long term weather changes have finally appeared in the form of new charts from the USDA, which after all, are only predictive and not infallible indicators of anything.

There are some practical considerations in all this and that’s what you need to think about when reading this post. The change in weather patterns means that you need to rethink your garden a bit. Not only do you need to consider the change in heat (the main emphasis of those hardiness zone charts), but also differences in moisture and even the effect on clouds. Little things are going to change as well. For example, have you considered the effect of increased lightning on the nitrogen levels in your soil? If not, you really should think about it. The weird science bandied about by those in the know has practical implications for those of us who raise food to eat after all.

Even if you aren’t into gardening at a very deep level, the changes in the hardiness zone chart has one practical implication that no one can escape. The literature on the back of those seed packets you buy from the store is going to be incorrect for this year as a minimum. The changes from the USDA came out after the seed packets were already printed. When everything else is said and done, the main reason for my post today is to help you understand that you can’t believe the seed package—at least, you can’t believe it this year. By next year the seed companies will have recovered and the documentation on your seed packets will be useful again.

Springtime is approaching. If you live anywhere near my area of the country, it seems as if we’re going to have an early spring indeed. I don’t normally need to trim the trees in the orchard until the end of March. This year I’ll trim my trees on March 1st, a lot earlier than normal and even then, I might be trimming a bit late. A few people in our area have already seen budding trees. So, if you’re used to waiting until April or May before you get out very much, it may be a good idea to take a walk around your property now to see if there are any changes that you need to know about.

Global warming is a reality. The effects it will have on your garden and orchard are also a reality. Just what those effects are and precisely what has caused them are still being debated by those in the know, but if you’re a gardener, you need to be aware that the garden you had last year may not work this year. Let me know about the global warning-related changes in your garden at [email protected].

Celebrating with Birthday Butter

Rebecca grows quite a few herbs. In fact, the majority of herbs used in our house come from Rebecca’s garden and not from the store. People have asked us in the past how to use these herbs. Of course, there are the mundane uses of savory herbs (such as sage) in meat dishes and sweet herbs (such as mint) in cakes and cookies. However, if you’re really interested in shaking things up, you mix the herbs in new and interesting combinations. That’s what I decided to do in making birthday butter.

Birthday butter was actually created for Rebecca’s birthday. I used it for her breakfast. I spread the birthday butter on a bagel, but it tastes just fine on toast, crumpets, English muffins, or any other sort of bread. In this case, I filled the holes in the center of the bagel halves with cherry tomatoes to dress it up a bit. The result is an interesting mix of savory and sweet that is a delight to the palette. Here’s the birthday butter recipe:

1/2 cup	Butter, Smart Balance, or Margarine
2 tsp	Sugar or Splenda
2 tsp	Rubbed Sage
1 tsp	Mint Leaves
1 tsp	Lemon Juice

Cream the butter in a bowl. Place the remaining ingredients in the bowl. Mix together until blended. The lemon juice will have a tendency to separate from the rest of the mixture, so remixing is needed if you store the unused portion.

I found that butter works far better for this recipe than margarine does. We’ve actually tried something new, Smart Balance Buttery Sticks with Omega 3 Fatty Acids. This product is half butter and half margarine. It cooks extremely well and tastes much like butter does. However, it significantly reduces the amount of cholesterol you receive and the Omega 3 fatty acids are actually good for you. I’m not sure how this recipe would work using other alternative sweeteners, but the results with Splenda are quite good.

The kind of mint you use has a big impact on the taste of birthday butter. Try various mint varieties out to see for yourself. The original version uses spearmint, but peppermint or even wintergreen would probably work just fine. For something unusual, try orange or lime mint.

The best way to get the ingredients to mix properly is to use a mixer. However, I’ve been able to get them to mix just fine using a fork. The point is, this butter blend has a wonderful taste and is a great way to start the day. How do you use your herbs? Let me know at [email protected].

The Wonders of Queen Anne’s Lace

Sometimes, the best herb or edible plant is the one you didn’t plant. Nature provides a number of edible plants that grow naturally where you live. I’ve shared about the berries that grow in our woods before. There are blackcaps, blackberries, gooseberries, wild grapes, wild plums, and choke cherries available to anyone who wants to pick them in the woods. You can also find any number of usable mushrooms and other useful plants out there. However, the wild grass area also has abundance to offer. One of the most useful plants is Queen Anne’s Lace, also known as wild carrot.

It’s quite possible that you’ve passed this plant by in the past because it normally grows in with the rest of the weeds. The large taproot is edible. However, you don’t want to dig it up mid-summer. It’s better to dig up a second year plant early in the spring or a first year plant late in the fall. Wait until the plant is dormant or you’ll end up with something that’s akin to shoe leather without much value. Older plants develop a woody interior (xylem) that’s most definitely unpalatable.

Some people actually use a tea made from the root for a number of medicinal purposes. When the root is used for medicinal reasons, the common wisdom is to dig it up in July, which is the same time the plant flowers in profusion.

Wild carrot is an ancestor of the modern cultivated carrot, but they’re different plants. In other words, it would require a lot of work to change Queen Anne’s Lace into anything resembling a domesticated plant and you should focus on the usefulness of the wild plant instead.

One of the most delightful uses of Queen Anne’s Lace is to make jelly from the flowers. You must pick a lot of fresh flowers—the more the better. I normally provide Rebecca with at least two shopping bags full of flowers to make jelly and it takes quite a while to obtain that many flowers, but the effort is most definitely worth it. The Queen Anne’s Lace flower looks like this.

In some cases, the center of the flower will contain a purple floret, but I’ve found that the purple floret is somewhat rare. Before you go out and pick a bunch of flowers that look just like this one though, be aware that many flowers have precisely the same coloration and similar appearance. For example, the hemlock flower and fool’s parsley are easy to confuse with this flower. Fortunately, it’s easy to avoid the mistake. Hemlock and fool’s parsley both tend to grow in wetter areas, while Queen Anne’s Lace prefers a drier spot to grow. In addition, Queen Anne’s Lace has a distinctive carrot leaf like the one shown here (the photograph is courtesy of my friend William Bridges):

When picking Queen Anne’s Lace, look for the flower in July, check the flowers carefully, and verify that the leaves are correct. If necessarily dig a plant up to ensure you’re getting the right one. The root will have a distinctive carrot aroma. If you take these four precautions, you won’t ever have any trouble.

There is conflicting information about the use of the leaves. I’ve never personally eaten the leaves and based on the conflicting information, I’d recommend not eating them. Here’s the Queen Anne’s Lace jelly recipe (courtesy of Rebecca).

Queen Anne’s Lace Jelly

2 qts	Flower Heads, Rinsed
	Boiling Water to Cover
2	Lemons, Juiced
2 packets	Certo
6 cups	Sugar
Dash	Cinnamon or Nutmeg

Infuse flowers in boiling water for 4 to 5 hours. Strain the result to obtain 5 cups of liquid. Add lemon juice, sugar, and spices. Bring the mixture to a boil. Add Certo. Bring to a full boil for 1 minute. Prepare the jelly according to the instructions on the Certo package. Can using a boiling water bath for 10 minutes.

The jelly has a subtle taste. It really is hard to describe, but think of something with an almost honey-like taste, but a bit of spiciness too. Add some tea and an English muffin, and you have a wonderful breakfast. The jelly ends up with a wonderful amber appearance.

So, what are your favorite wild plants? Do you use them regularly? Let me know at [email protected].

Drying Herbs

This is the time of year when Rebecca starts drying the herbs that have been growing since early spring. Most of them have gotten quite tall. I’ll discuss one of my favorites in this post, lime mint, but she’s working on a host of other herbs as well. Of course, the drying process starts by picking the herbs. She started with a relatively large bunch of lime mint like this:

In order to dry herbs, you need some means of drying them. Some people use their ovens, which can sometimes damage the herbs. It’s possible to dry the herbs in the sun, assuming you have a nice place to do it and the temperatures are high enough. We use an American Harvest dehydrator like the one shown here.

It’s such a handy device that we own three of them and sometimes all three of them are in use drying various items. Rebecca makes vegetable chips and apple chips for me to use as snacks (among other items). She has also made venison jerky for me using one of these devices. Two of our dehydrators have the top mounted heater and fan, while the third is bottom mounted. When it comes to drying herbs, there really isn’t any advantage over using one or the other.

In order to dry the herbs, the leaves are stripped from the stem and then placed in a fairly shallow pile in the dehydrator trays. It’s perfectly acceptable to put the younger tops in whole, but you don’t want the really stiff stems in with the rest of the herbs. Here’s how a typical tray will look.

After you’ve finished filling trays with the herbs, you’ll need to set the dehydrator for 105 degrees. It takes about 6 hours to dry the herbs. During that time, you’re treated to the most exotic smells. The entire house was filled with the smell of fresh mint this morning—it’s indescribable. The stack of herbs you saw earlier filled nine trays like this:

You’ll want to take the lid off from time-to-time to check the herbs (don’t do it any more than about once an hour). About halfway through the process, you’ll want to rearrange the trays, placing the bottom ones year the top (and vice versa) to ensure the herbs dry evenly. The herbs will look like this about halfway through the process.

When the herbs are completely dry, they’ll be a dark green. They’ll also crumble quite easily. Don’t be too shocked by the amount of herb you get for the initial investment. Here’s the completed lime mint from that entire bunch that you saw earlier (about 1/3 of a quart).

There is nothing quite so nice as home dried herbs. You’ll use quite a bit less of them than the herbs you get from the store. Rebecca places any extra herbs in a sealable bag, uses a Food Saver to vacuum seal the bag, and then places it in the freezer. This approach keeps the herbs extra fresh. Growing and preserving your own herbs makes for amazing meals and drinks (think herbal teas of your own design). Wouldn’t it be nice to be nice to be able to use your own herbs whenever you wanted? Let me know what you think at [email protected].

Making Self-Sufficiency Relationships Work

A comment I regularly receive is that people can’t understand how Rebecca and I can work so closely together and for so many years. (We recently celebrated 31 wonderful years together, 25 of which we’ve worked in business together and 13 of which we’ve been self-sufficient.) Of course, there isn’t any hard and fast answer to this question and what works for us is unlikely to work for anyone else.

However, I think you could boil some of the key elements down to a few words, such as mutual respect. We do odd things like say, “Please” and “Thank you.” I say these things are odd because I don’t know that many couples exercise the option to show each other courtesy. We also expect that we’ll fail and that the other person will also fail–that forgiveness is both necessary and desired. If people simply respected each other and employed courtesy freely, I’m sure the divorce rate would decrease. Worrying more about the other person than yourself has gone out of style, unfortunately, so I’m sure the divorce lawyers such as Simon Law attorneys who are skiled in this area, have nothing to worry about.

Divorcing is obviously not what the future couples had in mind when they married each other, but let’s face it, it happens, and the only way to get through it is to make sure both sides are treated fairly – that is the primary purpose of marital dissolution and the lawyers who can help with this approach the matter with both firmness and compassion because they recognize the vast amount of stress that one might feel going through a divorce and having their dreams for a happy home life sent into disarray. Moreover, with more and more couples choosing to get prenuptial agreements than ever before, getting an amicable divorce has never been easier. Provided that the prenuptial agreement has been checked over and validated by a team of prenup lawyers, then any property and assets owned by a couple should be able to be divided up in a mutually convenient manner.

That is not all though. Personally, I think that kinder divorces are going to become more commonplace. This is why divorce lawyers such as Peters And May are appointed to help those out who need a case settling. Divorce doesn’t have to mean hatred of the other, fairness should always play a part no matter the circumstances.

Rebecca has a special talent though that’s the topic of today’s post. She makes the mundane seem quite spectacular. Every year she creates a rock garden for me. It’s the first thing I see from the window when I get up in the morning and the last thing I see each night. I won’t share the window view, however–that’s exclusively for me. Here is a ground level view of some of the highlights of the garden. One of my current favorites is the Scottish bluebells:

The purple flowers really show up nicely. They’re getting tall and spiky now. Another colorful member of the rock garden is the blanket flower shown here:

From a color perspective, they remind me of a larger version of the Indian paintbrush that grows natively around here. We need to plant the blanket flower each year (the Scottish bluebells come back on their own each year).

The rock garden has a lot of shade, so Rebecca plants sedums freely in it. The blue spruce sedum is flowering right now. The yellowish flowers are a contrast to the rest of the plant and make it look quite fancy as shown here:

The autumn joy sedums are also quite pretty. The variegated version adds some lovely color to the rock garden as shown here:

At the front of this part of the rock garden is a John Creech sedum. All of these sedums will last through the winter. Rebecca normally covers them with leaves. However, if I ever found them in precisely the same spot for more than two years in a row, I’d be amazed. Rebecca loves to move things around.

A final offering is the Japanese painted fern. it looks a bit metallic in some respects as shown here:

These are young ferns. As they mature, the center will take on a more reddish hue. I’m looking forward to seeing what they look like later.

The care that Rebecca takes in maintaining this rock garden (and all of our other gardens) tells me a great deal about her love for me. That, in turn, makes it easier to overlook the rocks in the road we take together. I can’t imagine working anywhere without my wife. Together, the two of us make an amazing team.

If you’re going to enjoy your self-sufficiency, you need to come up with a plan to maintain your relationships. Being courteous helps, but taking time to care is better. Can you imagine working with your significant other for 25 years? I certainly hope that you’ve found the same joy that I have. Write me about your best experiences at [email protected].

Growing Herbs (Part 1)

We have a number of gardens on our property and some of them are quite specialized. For example, Rebecca grows a wide variety of mint. She has the usual spearmint, of course, but she grows a huge number of other mints. My personal favorite is lime mint. It actually a lime flavor underlying the mint taste. I find it refreshing during the winter months. Lime mint shares most of the same characteristics of other mints. It looks like this:

Some of the mints she grows don’t even have mint in the name. Of course, there’s catnip, a form of mint enjoyed mainly by cats. However, there is also lemon balm, another favorite of mine because it has a perky flavor that’s good during the daylight hours (lime mint is more for the evening to relax). You can see by this picture that the two mints look similar—the best way to tell mints apart is to look at the leaf size and shape, and then rub a bit on your fingers and sniff.

In addition to these mints, we also have orange mint, chocolate mint, and others. Rebecca will wait until these plants grow a bit taller and then take some (but not all) of the stalks inside for drying. She picks the individual leaves off and dries them in a food dehydrator. Another post will discuss this technique. We’re both strong advocates of dehydrating as a way of saving on storing costs and producing fat-free treats.

Lest you think our herb garden is entirely devoted to mint, we grow a wide variety of other plants as well. A favorite for soups is lovage, which has a strong celery taste. It grows as tall stalks with sparse leaves. Near the middle of the season the lovage plant will produce flowers. You can use the seeds as celery seed. Here’s what lovage looks like (we keep it in a tomato cage so it doesn’t blow over).

I use a lot of rosemary and thyme in my cooking, so Rebecca grows quite a bit each year. Rosemary has somewhat thick, almost cylindrical leaves and a strong aromatic odor. It does amazing things for chicken, lamb, and pork. Because we eat a lot of chicken, we use a lot of rosemary. Here’s what the young rosemary plant looks like:

By the way, just in case you’re wondering, yes those are nut shells. We don’t waste anything, not even nut shells. They actually make a fine addition to the herb garden soil and keep it loose. Eventually, the nut shells rot down and make nice compost for the herb garden.

Most people don’t realize it, but there are several different kinds of thyme. This year we have lemon, lime, and orange thyme. All three have a thyme taste and small, but with subtle differences. The plants actually look quite different, so it’s somewhat easy to tell them apart. Here’s the lemon thyme:

Notice that the lemon thyme has bits of yellow on its leaves. The leaves are also a bit rounder than other kinds of thyme. Compare the lemon thyme to the lime thyme shown here:

The lime thyme leaves are larger, brighter green, and a little elongated when compared to the lemon thyme. These leaves also last the yellow spots on them (making it a less pretty form of thyme in my opinion). Our newest kind of thyme is the orange thyme, which looks sort of like the lime thyme as shown here.

However, as you can see, the leaves of the orange thyme are much darker. In addition, the stems have a significant reddish cast to them. All three are thyme, but each has subtle differences that will make a big difference in cooking. We’ll use all three types with meat dishes, just like the rosemary.

I can’t do our herb garden justice in a single post, so expect to see more as the summer progresses. In the meantime, let me know if you have any questions at [email protected].

More Spring Weather

Our weatherman predicted rain with a slight chance of snow this Saturday, with an emphasis on slight. So it was without any hesitation whatsoever that I planned to be snowed in the next day. Fortunately, it wasn’t as bad as all that. I think we ended up with about an inch or two that quickly melted as shown here:

However, I do start to get worried about foul weather this time of year. Of course, there are my flowers to consider, but usually they hold up well. Even though my spring flowers look a bit crunched here, they sprang back up later:

More important are the fruit trees. Fortunately, none of them were blossoming yet this weekend. In years past, I’ve had the blossoms get damaged by late spring frosts—reducing my harvest later. Of course, the same thing can happen when snow or other weather elements keeps the pollinators inside and not out pollinating my trees. I hope that we don’t get more weather of this sort now that my trees are in the bud swell stage. All this led me to think of a haiku:

Crystal form that shows
Winter has not flown away
Spring is on the way!

Early Spring – The Flowers (Part 3)

Spring continues with its illustrious array of floral finery. The crocus have unfortunately croaked for the most part, but new flowers take their place. In fact, my spring bed is starting to look quite pretty with the introduction of hyacinth:

The daffodils have also made an appearance and are looking quite nice now:

The tulips aren’t quite in bloom yet, but it won’t be long now. They’re actually the last of my flowers to make an appearance in most years. Even so, you can see here that the wait won’t be much longer to enjoy their beauty:

Here’s hoping that your spring blooms are looking nice as well! Feel free to share your thoughts at [email protected].

Early Spring – The Flowers (Part 2)

It wasn’t long ago and my spring flowers were mere nubs in the ground. Well, things have certainly changed and now I’m seeing the first blooms! The crocus always seem to be the first to produce a bloom. Perhaps it’s because they have almost nothing in the way of leaves, so they focus all their energy on the lovely flowers they produce. I have two colors of crocus in my garden as shown here:

Of course, it won’t be long and more flowers will make their appearances. I’ll keep you updated as more flowers create a riot of color in my backyard. Spring flowers are always so welcome because they signal the end of winter.

Now, if only the weatherman would get the message. We’re supposed to get snow tonight. It won’t hang around, but the very idea that it’s coming is a reminder that winter hasn’t quite made a disappearance yet. What are your favorite spring flowers? Let me know at [email protected].

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