Mother's Herb Garden

Enlarge Image Image Gallery [Left] Renaisance Lutes were made from rosemary wood.[Right] Greek scholars wore rosemary wreaths to strengthen their memories.

Lately, more and more people have begun to understand just how limited-in both variety and nutritional value—our "modern" diets have become. This realization has sparked a new and widespread interest in the culinary and therapeutic uses of herbs ...those plants which—although not well-known-today-were, just one short generation ago, honored "guests" on the dinner tables and in the medicine chests of our grandparents' homes. In this regular feature, MOTHER will examine the availability, cultivation, and benefits of our "forgotten" vegetable foods and rem edies ...and-we hope-help prevent the loss of still another bit of ancestral lore.

Rosemary (literally "dew of the sea") is a woody shrub with narrow, rather stiff evergreen leaves that are dark green on top, grayish green underneath, and deeply scented. The common species, Rosmarinus ofcinalis, has small blue flowers that bloom along the upper stems of the plant in springtime. (There are, however, many upright and prostrate varieties, some of which have white or pink flowers.)

The fragrance of rosemary is warm, deep, and rather strong ...bringing to mind culinary delights, healing elixirs, exquisite perfumes, and the sun-drenched Mediterranean sea cliffs where it grows naturally. In fact, rosemary is a most evocative and useful herb, which has been cherished for centuries. It has been used in religious ceremonies as a symbol of fidelity, friendship, and remembrance ...planted in the garden to ward off cabbage moths, bean beetles, and carrot flies ...added to stews, salad dressings, lamb, and chicken for piquant flavor ...and shredded with coltsfoot to produce a substitute for tobacco.

Many legends surround this remarkable plant. One such tale has it that, during the flight into Egypt, the Virgin Mary washed her blue cloak and hung it on a rosemary bush to dry ...whereupon the shrub changed its white flowers to blue in her honor. The aromatic perennial is also supposed to flourish in households where the woman is dominant ...and not to grow at all in the gardens of the wicked!

To raise rosemary in your plot, you'll need full sun or semishade ...a welldrained, slightly alkaline sandy loam ...and a regular watering program (the herb greatly appreciates daily misting). And although some varieties can survive temperatures as low as 15° for short periods, rosemary can't tolerate heavy frost, so the plants should be taken indoors during the winter months in most areas of North America.