The Hungarian wanted to go to the local garden shop today, so of course I went along. I picked up a pretty silver lemon thyme (fantastic clean lemony smell) which I think will be good with vegetables (particularly green beans) and you might want to use it for fish and chicken dishes too. I also picked up a purely ornamental white variegated liriope--much whiter, with a pleasing gray-green stripe, than the variegated varities formerly available. (I like white variegations--they add a cooling touch to the garden.) You might want to keep an eye out for this attractive new "monkey grass." I picked up some English daisies too, purely sentimental reasons, and a 4-pack of cilantro for Mexican cooking. And I also brought home a Mexican oregano plant. Here's some info: http://www.linglesherbs.com/nletters/newsi1.htm Mexican oregano (Lippia graveolens) is the most popular oregano of the Southwestern U.S., and of course Mexico. If fact, when we in California buy dried oregano in the market, we invariably receive Mexican oregano. It is usually used in its dry form as it does retain much of its flavor when dried, unlike many other oreganos. Its oregano flavor, from the phenol carvacrol, is mixed with the slightest scent of camphor, which makes for an unusual, exotic taste.

Mexican oregano grows to be a tall shrub, with rather small oval leaves on erect, woody branches. It is very tender and can not take any freezing temperatures. In climates with colder winters it is grown as a annual, but near the Mexican border we have seen them over six feet tall, and obviously several years old. Even with our mild winters here in Southern California, we have lost our mother plants several seasons–including this one. The heavy rains we have received have ‘done it in’ again this year.

If you can find the plant, Mexican oregano is worthy growing as an annual. The scent of the leaves is the essence of Mexican cooking, and there are several recipes we could not cook without it, including enchiladas, chile rellenos, and posole. We’re sad to report that our back-up mother plant of Mexican oregano will supply few of the orders we receive for this plant this year.

-- Anonymous, April 19, 2001

Answers

I have a very extensive herb garden, and verigataed lemon tyme growing up in the courtyard, as we walk by the fresh clean scent of lemons waifs through the air!

-- Anonymous, April 20, 2001

I've had the plain lemon-flavored thyme for years and have started patches of it all over the yard--yep, you brush by or walk on it and it really smells lemony!

Someone gave me some lemon balm one year and, not knowing any better, I planted it in the ground. It's one of those plants that just takes over and it was ages before I got it all dug up.

Another plant in that category is artemisia 'Valerie Finnis'. It's a beautiful silver plant but runs rampant. I'm in the third year of pulling up unwanted shoots after digging up the main plant and chucking most of it on the compost heap after capturing some in a pot. (A plant has to be very badly behaved for me to nuke it.)

Mints, of course, tend to take over, as does that dreadful houttuyna (I know I'm spelling it wrong--you'll know it when you see it). But there are some good spreading plants you might want to take over. Vinca minor (periwinkle) and delosperma cooperi (ice plant) are two of these. You have to be careful with ajuga sp. near grassy areas because the plants are hard to dig up once established.

So many plants, so little thyme.

-- Anonymous, April 20, 2001