HERBS 103: Harvesting, Preserving & Overwintering Workshop Report

by Carol Kagan, Penn State Master Gardener, Franklin County

Although it was a crisp autumn start at this October 18 workshop, 17 attendees and 7 (yes, 7) Master Gardeners had a fun and informative (according to the evaluations) session.

At their seats attendees found peppermint cuttings that Jerry Lewis brought in.

Carol Kagan talked about air drying herbs and Trey Gelbach showed his dehydrator, putting in some herbs which he brought out near the end of the morning to demonstrate how quickly and thoroughly they dried. Barb Petrucci passed around samples of roses and other flowers she either air dried or dried with a desiccant. The difference in the colors and shapes were evident.

Barb, Jerry, Trey and Sue McMorris led the group over to the herb garden with baskets and shears where attendees were able to harvest a variety of herbs and flowers to take home. Popular take-aways were lavender and gomphrena.

Jean Schlecht and Maria Giles set out the refreshments and Maria put materials at each seat for a hands-on activity to prepare herbs to dry in the refrigerator.

When everyone returned from the gardens, refreshments were served and the hot mulled cider was popular. In addition there was cold cider, lemon-grass infused water, Apple Sage cake and Lavender Tea Biscuits (recipes below), as well as Trey's homemade dip of smoked jalapeno with homemade crostini and Sue's dill dip with chips.

Sue shared more methods of drying herbs including freezing and screen drying and reviewed the best way to preserve a variety of culinary herbs for later use.

Maria went over preserving herbs by drying in the refrigerator and had everyone folding up their thyme into neat little envelopes.

Trey, self-proclaimed "chili-head," showed off a variety of home-grown peppers, some of which were air dried and some smoked, passing these around along with some of the chili powders he made from them. Here he pulled some of the herbs from the dehydrator to show how fast they dried.

Carol reviewed the three methods to overwinter herbs: Protect outdoor perennials, bring plants inside, and create an indoor garden from seed, plant division or rooting cuttings. She also demonstrated pruning a winter savory (or perhaps a thyme plant, as there was a bit of pleasant dissent among the Master Gardeners as to which it was) and tips for rooting.

Along the way our students asked many good questions and among the seven Master Gardeners answers were found and sometimes explanations and cautions mentioned. Some of the participants attended all three of this year's Herb Series and received "Herb Enthusiast" certificates.

The session ended as Jerry shared some of his tips, especially about seed saving, and Jean Schlecht distributed the parsley and honey-melon sage she brought to share.


Honey melon sage (Salvia)

As per request, here are the two recipes for refreshments served at the workshop.

Lavender Tea Biscuits (Makes 6 doz. little 1” biscuits)

Ingredients

½ C. softened butter (1 stick)

½ C. sugar

1 egg

1 C. self-rising flour

1  ½ Tbsps. lavender buds

Preheat the oven to 350° F.

Cream the butter, sugar and egg. Add flour and lavender buds and mix well. Wrap and roll the mixture into 1" tubes (about 4 or 5 tubes) and refrigerate for 1 hour. *

Spray a mini-muffin tin with non-stick spray. Spoon marble-size (small) pieces of dough into each cup. Gently press with a wooden pestle dipped into water or sugar or use the back of a small spoon.

Bake 10-12 minutes. Remove while warm.

* Alternately you can freeze the tubes of mixture to use later. Cut 1/4" or smaller slices from the tube and place on a parchment covered baking sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes.

Apple Sage Cake (9”x13” pan)

Ingredients

3 large eggs, room temperature

1 ½ C. sugar

¾ C. vegetable oil

1/ ½ C. all-purpose flour

1 ½ tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

3 C. Granny Smith apples, peeled and shredded (about 3 apples)

½ C. fresh sage leaves, minced fine

Preheat the oven to 375° F.

Butter a 9”x13” baking pan and line it with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar and oil. Add in flour, baking soda and salt. Mix until well combined. Stir in apples and sage and mix well.

Pour into baking pan, releasing the air bubbles. Bake approximately 30 minutes, until the cake tester inserted in the middle comes out clean.

Let cool and serve as a cake or cut into small bites.

Snip Your Herbs: Use or Save for Winter

by Carol Kagan, Master Gardener



My Herb Garden July 2014

Another nice morning to work in the garden although at 7:30 am it was already a bit muggy.

Some C'munks in the Back Yard

Dale is alternating between munching on bird seed and raisins and chasing some other chipmunk around and out of the garden. I'm not quick enough with the camera to catch them running in and out of the petunias, daisies and herbs.

There seems to be a few new c'munks this year, hanging out in the back yard. Maybe they're scooting around front to munch on birdseed. We'll have to throw some out back, too.

 

The weather has been kind to the plants in my yard, providing just enough rain and warm weather. The herb bed, moved this year from the back raised bed due to black walnut contamination, is thriving.

Garden Sage

 The garden sage needed pruning so I took the opportunity to document what has become known as Maria's Drying Technique (after MG Maria G.). This is in preparation for the October 18 MG Workshop: Herbs 103: Harvesting, Preserving and Overwintering Herbs. *

Here's my first try at documenting this. The big picture is that the herbs, after washing and drying thoroughly, are wrapped in a paper towel and dried in the crisper or butter compartment of your refrigerator. This won't work with all that basil. Make pesto and freeze it.

After 2-3 weeks, the dried herbs can be removed and stored. The herbs dried with this method retain their color and do not turn that funky gray-brown like many of the air dried herbs.

Wash, dry thoroughly (Tip: Use a salad spinner to get most of the water off.), and carefully remove leaves from the stems. Place in a paper towel and fold up to a triangle. Fold the flaps in toward the center.

Fold the top triangle down past the bottom fold. Wrap the flap around to the back and tuck it in to form an envelope.

Close-up of the folded envelope

* Penn State Master Gardeners, Franklin County hold workshops all year. To register for a workshop, to get on the e-mailing or snail-mailing for information about workshops and events, call 717- 263-9226.

 

Here's a few of the upcoming workshops held at the Franklin County Ag Center, 181 Franklin Farm Rd. unless noted otherwise.

Sat, July 12:  Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head: 9-11 -Learn how to use rain barrels to store and use water in your garden. Make a rain barrel ($40) or just sit-in ($10) Deadline to register to make a rain barrel is July

Sat, August 2:  Succulents: 9-11 Learn how to grow and propagate these beautiful and nearly indestructible plants

Fun Events include

Sat, Aug 23: Tomato Tasting Day: 10-2pm Day change by popular demand!    Moved to Saturday- Open to the public. Free parking. Save the Date. Do blind taste tests of over 20 tomato varieties. Taste and vote in the Salsa Contest. See the winners of the ugliest tomato and the biggest tomato contest. Pick up some great tomato recipes. See and feed the ducks in the stream. Enjoy talking with Master Gardeners.

Sat, July 26 Summer Garden Experience: 9-1 pm -Tour the center, do tomato tasting which includes paste tomatoes this year, enjoy seminars; Speaker-Stephanie Cohen, Perennial Diva $10/carload– Located at 1446 Auction Rd Manheim, PA 17545



Another Sweetie - Aztec Sweet Herb

by Carol Kagan, Franklin County Master Gardener


Delphinium 'Blue Butterfly' - now at Jean S & my house

Jean S. called and invited me on a short road trip to Lurgan Greenhouse. What a great excuse to leave housework. Although the rumor that they were having "buy one, get one free" only applied to herbs and annuals, I can assure you the trunk and backseat had plenty of plants making the trip home.

Having just written the blog on Stevia (Stevia rebaudiana), the current fad in sugar substitute plants, I was interested in the herb they offered as Aztec Sweet Leaf (Lippia dulcis). This one is touted as having sweetness of 1500 times that of sugar. WHOA!

Sweet Aztec Leaf Plant (Tender perennial)

I tasted a leaf. Yes. Sweet. Very sweet. Very, very sweet.





Salvia 'Honey Melon' (Alan Buckingham)



I bought a Salvia 'Honey Melon' sage plant whose leaves taste mildly of cantaloupe. The plant label shows a plant that looks like pineapple sage.

This will most likely lose any flavor with cooking but should be an interesting addition to fruit salads and maybe as a drink garnish. I got the Sweet Leaf free.


In looking up the Sweet Leaf plant online I was surprised to see warnings about using it internally.



It turns out that in addition to hernandulcin, an intensely sweet compound which is a volatile oil constituent, the leaves also contain significant amount of camphor. According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information of the National Institutes of Health, listing a research article in the Journal of Ethnopharmacology (Lippia dulcis-Abstract), camphor is approximately 53% of the plant's oils.


The NCBI abstract notes: "This plant began to be used as an official drug in the late 19th century for the treatment of coughs and bronchitis, and at that time preliminary phytochemical investigations were undertaken. Field work carried out in Mexico in 1981 and 1982 has indicated that there is still an active trade involving L. dulcis, which is sold primarily in market places for its alleged abortifacient activity. We have obtained no evidence, either from the literature or from field inquiries, that L. dulcis has ever been used for sweetening foods or beverages."

Alas, while one or two leaves in a cup of tea may be okay, and a number of sites mentioning putting a few leaves in salads or fruit dishes, this plant is not going to replace Stevia any time soon.

The plant has a low growth habit, sending out runners, and would make an interesting hanging plant. The dark green leaves highlight very tiny, but pretty, white flowers. It's a tender perennial in zone 6 (no frost tolerance), is a fast growing, low creeper, with small white flowers and would be excellent in hanging baskets. Full sun, please.