Drinkable Herbs
We’re continuing to work our way through a year’s worth of grow-your-own cocktail ingredients, moving on this month from flowers to herbs. Let’s start with some of the sweeter, more floral herbs you might mix into a drink, and next month I’ll move on to the savory herbs. Autumn is a great time to plant any of these. Just water them until it starts raining, then stand back and let them take care of themselves through the winter. Anise hyssop (Agastache foeniculum) Also called ‘licorice mint,’ this tough little perennial is, in fact, a member of the mint family, and the...
Read MoreThe Pineapple Express
This recipe was served by the nice people at Combier in New Orleans this summer when I gave a talk about The Drunken Botanist (the book, that is—it’ll be out next March.) We called it The Drunken Botanist that day, but it normally goes by the name Pineapple Express. There is one new and unusual ingredient here: Combier Kummel, a modern version of a traditional caraway, cumin, and fennel-flavored herbal liqueur. If you don’t have kummel and can’t get it, I’ll let you in on a little secret: tequila and pineapple are amazing together. Get some pineapple juice and a good...
Read MorePineapple Sage
Pineapple sage (Salvia elegans) I was talking to a friend on the East Coast about this plant, and he was complaining that it was available for such a short time there. Well, here on the West Coast, it’s almost a weed. If you don’t get much of a frost, you’ll be able to harvest it all year. This salvia (also in the mint family) produces stalks of red, tubular flowers that hummingbirds love, and the leaves are, in fact, pineapple-flavored. There’s a variety called ‘Golden Delicious’ with chartreuse leaves and red flowers, but it’s not really a strong bloomer, and it only...
Read MoreBooks by Amy Stewart
The Drunken Botanist
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