“THE OLD POT-HERBS IN THE FLOWER GARDEN”©

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cottage garden

I envision a combination of beauty and function with regard to my principal flower garden this year as I intend to tuck herbs here and there into corners and bare spots transforming the existing garden into an old fashioned cottage garden.  The herbs will add to the floral fragrance wafting through the night air while they add beauty and grace through their own leaves and flowers, and, I ask you, who could not love stepping into the flower garden for a few pot-herbs to flavor the evening’s dinner?

While I have seen it quite clearly in my head through the dreary winter months, I am, after all, Thehistoricfoodie, so is there any historical basis for this co-mingling of flowers and herbs?  Yes!  I’m delighted with my plan and that it mirrors the author’s description in the article below just adds to my gardening giddiness!

I already have seed orders in for most of the flowers and herbs discussed below and intend to transplant some existing herbs.  Having found this article shortly after my second seed order went to Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, I see I was remiss in not ordering hyssop.

My seed stash already contains lovage and sorrel, which, due to their size will grace the outer edges of the garden and purslane that will go into its own bed as it self-sows so readily.  Lacinto kale will add color and form to the garden and its leaves will certainly find their way into the soup pot.  Nasturtium is the epitome of beauty and function as its leaves and flowers are beautiful garnishes or salad ingredients and the buds can be pickled like capers.

The plants already at home in the garden include heirloom fragrant roses, daffodils, iris, daylilies, Echinacea, rudbeckia, phlox, verbena, blackberry lily, spider lily, rosemary, hollyhock, Sweet William, snapdragons, hyacinths, etc.  I love the following article because it so beautifully described what I have envisioned my garden will look like after I mix the herbs in with the flowers.

“The Old Pot-Herbs in the Flower Garden.  Some of these pot-herbs are beautiful things, deserving a place in any flower garden.  Sage, for instance, a half shrubby plant with handsome gray leaf and whorled spikes of purple flowers, is a good plant both for winter and summer, for the leaves are persistent and the plant well clothed throughout the year.  Hyssop is another such handsome thing, of the same family, with a quantity of purple bloom in the autumn, when it is a great favourite with the butterflies and bumble bees.  This is one of the plants that were used for an edging in gardens in Tudor days, as we read in Parkinson’s ‘Paradisus,’ where Lavender Cotton, Marjoram, Savoury, and Thyme are also named as among the plants used for the same purpose.  Rue, with its neat bluish green foliage, is also a capital plant for the garden where this colour of leafage is desired.  Fennel, with its finely-divided leaves and handsome yellow flower, is a good border flower, though rarely so used, and blooms in the late autumn.  Lavender and rosemary are both so familiar as flower garden plants that we forget that they can also be used as neat edgings if from the time they are young plants they are kept clipped.  Borage has a handsome blue flower, as good as its relation the larger Anchuss [?].  Tansy, best known in the gardens by the handsome Achilles Eupatorium, was an old inmate of the herb garden.  Sweet Cicely (Myrrhis odorata) has beautiful foliage, pale green and Fern-like with a good umbel of white bloom, and is a most desirable plant to group with and among early-blooming flowers.  And we all know what a good garden flower is the common pot Marigold.  From Elgood’s ‘Some English Gardens’.”  – The Garden.  Jan. 7, 1905.

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CLASSIC HERBS and HERB BLENDS©

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herbs, pot-herbs, sweet-herbs

Up to the early/mid twentieth century, certain culinary herbs were commonly used together in soup, sauces, stuffing, etc. and these blends had various names depending on who you asked about them.  Some are perennial, meaning they come back each spring, and others may have spread through the seed they produced the previous year so that once established the cook need never worry about what to use to season her soup.

“As so many herbs are perennial, coming up year after year and often spreading rapidly from the root or from self-sown seed, as do the lemon balm, bergamot, lovage, thyme, sage, fennel, the various mints, the true tarragon, lavender, and many others it is well to prepare as large a space as possible in planning the original herb-bed”.

These can vary with location and climate, but let’s take a quick look at which herbs are perennial or that readily self-sow (I’m zone 8a):

Self-sow:  garden angelica, borage, basil, calendula, chamomile, chervil, cilantro/coriander, parsley, dill, chives, edible docks, sorrel, fennel, lemon balm, horseradish, oregano, and purslane.

Perennial:  bergamot, caraway, catnip, chicory, chives, fennel, ginger, horseradish, lavender, lemon balm, lemon grass, lovage, marjoram, mint, oregano, Roman chamomile, sorrel, tarragon, winter savory.

Evergreen Perennial:  bay, hyssop, lavender, rosemary, sage, and thyme.  These are not worth the effort to dry as they can be picked fresh any time of year.

The beauty of herbs for seasoning is not that any one should be dominant, but how some of them blend so beautifully, coming together in perfect harmony.  These should be the basis of any herb garden and the blends may be made after you dry your summer bounty.  The following range in date from 1840s through 1920s.

SOUP-BUNCH.  This is a bunch of young onions or leeks, carrots, and various herbs to be found in the market in most large places such as green sage, thyme, marjoram etc.; celery-tops are sometimes included.d  The onions and carrots and other vegetables can be cut in pieces for the soup, but the herbs are best folded in thin muslin and taken out after 10 minutes of simmering in the soup.

SOUP BOQUET.  A boquet [sic] of herbs for flavoring soups and sauces is much used by foreign cooks, and is made of a few sprigs of parsley, thyme, celery leaves, 1 or 2 leaves of sage and a bay leaf.  This may be folded in a small square of tarlatan or other thin cloth, and wound with a thread.  This can be put in the soup for a little time, and all removed without trouble when the soup is served.  [Cheesecloth works nicely to hold your herbs as does an old-fashioned tea ball.]

VIRGINIA FLAVORING.  Take thyme, mint, sweet marjoram, and rosemary gathered in full perfection; pick from the stalks, put them in a large jar, pour on strong vinegar, and let stand 24 hours; then take out the herbs, throw in fresh bunches, and do this 3 times; then strain the liquor, put it in bottles, cork and seal tight.  Do not let the herbs stay in more than 24 hours at one time, else a bitter, unsavory taste may be imparted.  What is wanted, is just the delicate first flavor which comes from stepping the herbs in the liquid.  It makes a delicious flavor for soups and sauces.

HERBS, A BUNCH OF SWEET.  Is made up of parsley, sweet marjoram, winter savory, orange and lemon thyme; the greatest proportion of parsley.

HERBS, SWEET.  These in cookery are parsley, chibbol, [several spellings, a small onion or leeks] rocambole, [a garlic or shallot] winter savory, thyme, bay-leaf, basil, mint, borage, rosemary, cress, marigold, marjoram, &c.  The relishing herbs or Ravigotte are tarragon, garden-cress, chervil, burnet, civet, [civette is the correct spelling, another name for chives] and green mustard.

BOUQUET GARNI.  It was quite formerly known as a FAGGOT.   Parsley, thyme, and bay-leaf.  In its most simple form it consists of a sprig of thyme, marjoram, and a bay-leaf wrapped together in parsley, and tied into a little roll.  To these may be added a small quantity of one or more of the following:  chervil, chives, celery leaf, basil, tarragon.

FINES HERBS.  Chop fine 6 shallots, place them with 1 ounce butter over the fire, cook 3 minutes; then add ½ cupful fine-chopped mushrooms, cook slowly 10 minutes; remove from fire; dip 2 sprigs of parsley in boiling water, instantly remove, chop fine, add 1 tablespoonful of it to the above preparation; season with ½ teaspoonful salt, and the same of grated nutmeg.  If not used all at once, put it in a small glass jar, cover with buttered paper, and keep in a cool place.

“Fines herbes are used for gratins, barigoules, [formerly this referred to artichokes stuffed with mushrooms] papillotes, [a method of cooking in a folded packet of parchment paper or foil] also for Sharp and Italian Sauce”.

HERBS DE PROVENCE.  Recipes vary from one cook to another but the most common ingredients are basil, bay leaf, marjoram, rosemary, summer savory and thyme with lavender being also quite common.

POT HERBS.  “Pot herbs include all those varieties of herbs which may be grown in the kitchen garden—parsley, chervil, chives, thyme, sage, savory, basil, sweet marjoram, tarragon and rosemary. . .There are other herbs which might be included in this list of pot herbs; they are not so well known but have good qualities; among these are dill, fennel, mustard, caraway and borage”.

As always, Blissful Meals and Happy Gardening. © Blog articles may not be reproduced without permission of the author.

A DINNER OF HERBS©

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culinary herbs, herbs

As spring approaches I prepare to perfect my herb garden planting as many perennial culinary herbs as I can fit into corners of my flower garden or containers placed in empty spots so my thoughts turned to the old fashioned kitchen gardens.  The following is one woman’s ideas on using her herbs to prepare an entire dinner.  In addition to those discussed in the quote, the author also discussed growing and using tansy, marjoram, basil, balm, rosemary, clary, lavender, dill, fennel, angelica, anise, caraway, coriander, chervil, cumin, horehound, lovage, marigold, samphire, borage, rue, and winter savory.

“To prepare a dinner of herbs in its best estate you should have a bed of seasonings such as our grandmothers had in their gardens, rows of sage, of spicy mint, sweet marjoram, summer savory, fragrant thyme, tarragon, chives, and parsley.  To these we may add, if we take herbs in the Scriptural sense, nasturtium, and that toothsome esculent, the onion, as well as lettuce.  If you wish a dinner of herbs and have not the fresh, the dried will serve, but parsley and mint you can get at most times in the markets, or in country gardens, where they often grow wild.

Do you know, my sister housewife, that if you were to have a barrel sawed in half, filled with good soil, some holes made in the side and then placed the prepared half barrel in the sun, you could have an herb garden of your own the year through, even if you live in a city flat?  In the holes at the sides you can plant parsley, and it will grow to cover the barrel, so that you have a bank of green to look upon.  On the top of the half barrel plant your mint, sage, thyme, and tarragon.  Thyme is so pleasing a plant in appearance and fragrance that you may acceptably give it a place among those you have in your window for ornament.

The Belgians make a parsley soup that might begin your dinner, or rather your luncheon.  For the soup, thicken flour and butter together as for drawn butter sauce, and when properly cooked thin to soup consistency with milk.  Flavor with onion juice, salt and pepper.  Just before serving add enough parsley cut in tiny bits to color the soup green.  Serve croutons with this.

For the next course choose an omelette with fine herbs. . .added to it minced thyme, tarragon and chives. . .

Instead of an omelette you may have eggs stuffed with fine herbs and served in cream sauce.  Cut hard-boiled eggs in half the long way and remove the yolks.  Mash and season these, adding the herbs, as finely minced as possible.  Shape again like yolks and return to the whites.  Cover with a hot cream sauce and serve before it cools.  Both of these dishes may be garnished with shredded parsley over the top.

With this serve a dish of potatoes scalloped with onion.  Prepare by placing in alternate layers the two vegetables; season well with salt, pepper, and butter, and then add milk even with the top layer.  This dish is quite hearty and makes a good supper dish of itself.

Of course you will not have a meal of this kind without salad.  For this try a mixture of nasturtium leaves and blossoms, tarragon, chives, mint, thyme and the small leaves of the lettuce, adding any other green leaves to the spicy kind which you find to taste good.  Then dress these with a simple oil and vinegar dressing, omitting sugar, mustard or any such flavoring, for there is spice enough in the leaves themselves.

Pass with these, if you will, sandwiches made with lettuce or nasturtium dressed with mayonnaise.  You may make quite a different thing of them by adding minced chives or tarragon, or thyme, to the mayonnaise. . .

Whether this ‘dinner of herbs’ appeals to the reader or not, I venture to say that no housewife who has ever stuffed a Thanksgiving turkey, a Christmas goose or ducks or chickens with home-grown home-prepared herbs, either fresh or dried, will ever after be willing to buy the paper packages or tin cans of semi-inodorous, prehistoric dust which masquerades equally well as ‘fresh’ sage, summer savory, thyme or something else. . .”.

Blissful meals and Joyful Gardening!©

Source:  Kains, Maurice Grenville.  “Culinary Herbs”.  New York.  1920.