Chamomile

This year's One Seed Chicago choices are chamomile, basil, and cilantro. I think it's the first year that I've actually liked every choice, and would feel just fine no matter which one wins (last tiny sniff for last year's loser- eggplant). I'll do some posts on the other two choices as well.

Therefore, I'm not tipping my hand, (I'll do some posts on the other two choices as well) but I want to depress some misinformation that has started to get out there via Mike Nowak's show during the announcement:

Chamomile is not hard to grow

I first planted chamomile maybe a decade ago. It's the only time I've ever planted it, and yet I get more chamomile every year than I can use. This is because it reseeds. And I just let it go--I have

Grown for a plant sale in 2011

chamomile in the ornamental beds, in the herb beds, in the berry patch, in the tomatoes, in the onions. It's kind of fun to see where it pops up. If it's really somewhere that I don't want it, I let it get about 5 inches tall, and then move it.

Chamomile is pretty, and it behaves itself. Unlike other flowering herbs, like dill, it doesn't get leggy or wild. The biggest drawback of chamomile is that it's a drag to harvest.

I suppose there are probably other uses for chamomile, but primarily I use it for tea. The tea is made from the yellow seed heads, and you want them without the white petals. I wait for the petals to drop, then I grap the top of a given plant, and just hack all the seed heads off with their stems. Then, unfortunately, you have to remove the stems from all the hundreds of tiny seed heads, and any petals that are left. I put it in a pie pan to dry. Don't crumble it (it may fall apart on its own); store in jars.

What you're left with is the most flavorful tea you can imagine. You'll never drink commercial chamomile tea again--the flavor is a pale shadow of the real thing. I grow enough every year to get me through the winter, because you barely need any to make a pot since the flavor is so strong.

As far as next year, it's just about impossible to harvest it all, so some of the seed heads will fall into the soil, and you'll have chamomile next year too. I'm a little worried this year, because a lot of chamomile has sprouted already because of the extended warmth this year.

Self-seeded chamomile in my Savory Walk

Maybe it will be the first year I need to replant! If so, I might get some seeds from One Seed Chicago.

Garden party

We do a Lammas Festival party every year to celebrate the garden and the first harvest. (Held a little early this year due to other scheduling problems. )

As we were setting up and cleaning up the week before, I started digging around to see what paper plates and plastic glasses and utensils we still had left over from the last one.

Stop.

When you switch over to a more sustainable way of living, it's not just about how you do things and what you buy. You have to rearrange the synapses. It took a slow grinding of the gears for me to absorb the inconsistency of seasonal-local-sustainable served on throw-away plates. So we headed to the thrift store and picked up a giant load of cheap glassware. We got bamboo plates, which we will use til they're unusable, and then compost. We pulled out all of our forks, and just kept washing them all day when we ran out

There are days when I think how silly it is for this one little two-person household to try to save the planet. And then I look at the trash we ended up with yesterday. Namely, none. We gave a party attended by more than 50 people, and did not generate any trash. The food went into the compost. The bottles went into the recycling. The tableware went into the sink. Fifty people from 30 households observed this, including a large percentage of young people, whom we are trying to save the planet for.

Seasonal. Local. Organic. Whole. And trash-free.

Word.


Chamomile-Raspberry-Ginger tea
5 tablespoons chamomile or 6 teabags
1/4 cup fresh raspberries
2 large pieces of candied ginger, diced
4 cups boiling water
2 cups cool water

Steep the chamomile, raspberries and ginger in the boiling water, about 2 hours (until water is cool). Add cool water. pour into ice-cube filled glasses. Garnish with fresh chamomile flowers.

Solstice

For Midsummer Day, I started hunting around for plants and rituals associated with the solstice, and found a lot of information about chamomile, an herb which I’ve been looking into lately anyway (since it appears I will have a LOT).

From herbalremedies.com “Chamomile is one of the ‘Nine Sacred Herbs’ of the Lacnunga, an ancient Anglo-Saxon manuscript. The strong association Chamomile has with the Sun is an underlying indication of its modern usage. Through incense or ritual drink it is used to assist a priest’s call to the Sun God (those working with any of the solar deities). Some traditions have used Chamomile at Midsummer to give honor to the Father of Nature.

My herbalist friend "Om" says,

We use chamomile tea in the chalice and horn cup at our Summer Solstice rituals, especially at the height of the day when it is families with lots of kids. It also brews into a delightful wine. I have also added it to the vinaigrette to go on a feast salad, and put it in fire fruit salad (a mix of citrus fruits that are red, yellow and orange, along with cinnamon and cumin as the main spices). The leaves work well in incense this time of year, and as part of the bundle of herbs used for sweeping and/or asperging.

I harvested the flowers from one of my volunteers and hope to be able to harvest enough to have tea all the way through the winter this year. (Right now I have about 1 cup of dried flowers, with several months of bloom left to go, and 14 plants.)