Growing Your Own Herbs

If you’re not the type of person that wants to spend their time managing

an elaborate fruit or vegetable garden, you might consider planting and

maintaining an herb garden. While the product might not seem as

significant, you’ll still enjoy the constant availability of fresh,

delicious herbs to flavor your meals with.

First you’ll want to choose the herbs that you’ll plant. You might have a

hard time doing this because of the huge scope of herbs available. But the

best way to choose is to do what I did; just look at what you have in your

kitchen. By planting your own collection of these herbs, you can save

money on buying them from the grocery store while having the added benefit

of freshness. Some of the herbs you might start with include rosemary,

sage, basil, dill, mint, chives, and parsley among others.

When choosing an area to put your herb garden, you should remember that

the soil should have extremely good drainage. If the dirt gets watered and

stays completely saturated, you have no chance of ever growing a healthy

plant. One of the best ways to fix the drainage problem is to dig a foot

deep in the soil, and put a layer of crushed rocks down before replacing

all the soil. This will allow all that water to escape, thus saving your

plants.

When you are ready to begin planting herbs, you might be tempted to buy

the more expensive plants from the store. However, with herbs it is much

easier to grow them from seed than it is with other plants. Therefore you

can save a bundle of money by sticking with seed packets. Some herbs grow

at a dangerously fast rate. For example, if you plant a mint plant in an

open space then it will take over your entire garden in a matter of days.

The best way to prevent this problem is to plant the more aggressive

plants in pots (with holes in the bottom to allow drainage, of course).

When it comes time to harvest the herbs you have labored so hard over, it

can be fatal to your plant to take off too much. If your plant isn’t well

established, it isn’t healthy to take any leaves at all, even if it looks

like its not using them. You should wait until your plant has been well

established for at least several months before taking off any leaves. This

wait will definitely be worth it, because by growing unabated your plant

will produce healthily for years to come.

Once you’ve harvested your delicious home grown herbs, you’ll want to use

them in cooking. Why else would you have grown them? Well first the

process begins with drying them out. This is easily achieved by placing

them on a cookie sheet and baking them 170 degrees Fahrenheit for 2 to 4

hours. After they’re sufficiently dried to be used in cooking, you can

consult the nearest cookbook for instructions on using them to effectively

flavor a dish.

If you want to store your herbs for later usage, you should keep them in a

plastic or glass container. Paper or cardboard will not work, because it

will absorb the taste of the herbs. During the first few days of storage,

you should regularly check the container and see if any moisture has

accumulated. If it has, you must remove all the herbs and re-dry them. If

moisture is left from the first drying process, it will encourage mildew

while you store your herbs. Nobody likes mildew.

So if you enjoy herbs or gardening, or both, then you should probably

consider setting up an herb garden. It might require a little bit of work

at first to set it up for optimal drainage, and pick what herbs you want

to grow. But after the initial hassle, it’s just a matter of harvesting

and drying all your favorite herbs.