Herb Garden

While mom was here over the weekend I decided to put her gardening expertise to use and have her help me plant an herb garden. Back when I was in grad school I bought the Chia herb garden, thinking it would be super easy as Chia plants always were. Sadly I just never got the plants to grow. Since we've been here in California I have been inspired by all the plants we have around us, grapefruit, blackberries, grapes, olives, etc. That and we always seem to be running to the store to buy mint for our cocktails. At $2 a packet I figured it must be cheaper to just have a plant.

So off we headed to Home Depot to buy seedlings, pots, soil, and patio containers. We also stopped by the local farmers market to pick up a few missing herbs that we didn't find at Home Depot, mainly a mint plant. While we were at the farmer's market we also sampled chocolate mint. If you ever see it, try a leaf, it's pretty much awesome. If I can figure out what I would use it for and I can keep these first herbs alive I am definitely going to invest in some.

What we did end up with was flat and curly leaf parsley, basil, chives, cilantro, thyme, rosemary and mint. So far they are happily sitting on the patio enjoying the sun and the ocean breezes. We have used the cilantro in homemade guacamole, parsley in our pasta salad and mint in our cocktails. And next time we do our mustard glazed pork loin we are going to use home grown thyme instead of the store bought stuff.

P.S. If you have any recipes that use fresh herbs, definitely send them my way!