Usually, people pick just the flowers. And that is a waste of good herb: the stems of chamomile (Matricaria recutita) are perfectly useful, if weaker than the yellow flower.
It’s easiest to just pull up a bunch of whole plants, roots and all – they’re annuals which lean on one another, and their taproots are really pretty small.
Pic: Drying chamomile. Discard any flowers and stems with aphids, pick off snails, discard flowers with spiders, and check for other infestations.
If your plants are in full flower, they’re about 1/2 m tall (perhaps 1.5′). The lower half is mostly yellow leaf, if your bunch was pulled up in a lushly growing spot. Break the stems one by one where the leaf turns green, and spread the top bits on a bit of old bedsheet laid on top of a thick layer of newspapers.
Let dry in a shady airy spot for 7-10 days.
Read the full story, click here!
No comments:
Post a Comment