My Favourites
Pack the flavours of your herb garden into a jar and give them to friends and family as gifts, writes editor Jane Wrigglesworth.
5 herbs to help you de-stress
Anxious, irritable or downright frazzled? Before you reach for for the prescription antidepressants or sleeping pills, you might want to consider one of these five herbs to help you de-stress.
Fight burnout naturally
Dr Rita Louise reveals a host of natural solutions to combat stress, fatigue and adrenal insufficiency.
Make your own perfume
Make your own beautifully scented perfumes – for yourself or as a gift. Jane Wrigglesworth shows you how she made this solid perfume, contained in a mirror compact.
Can’t sleep? These herbs may help
For years I’ve had problems sleeping – until I discovered these herbs. Learn which herbs could help you fall asleep. They worked for me.
DIY stress buster bath milk
Feeling stressed? Donna Lee from Cottage Hill Herbs explains how to make your own tension-reducing mix for the bath.
How to grow caraway
Want to grow your own spices? Try caraway, with its delicious aniseed-like flavour. We’ll tell you how easy it is to grow your own.
Homemade herb cheeses
Donna Lee from Cottage Hill Herbs dishes up homemade yoghurt cheeses. Serve these delicious cheeses with bread or crackers, or in salads.
Lemon balm for stress relief
Long revered for its medicinal properties, lemon balm (Melissa officinalis) has a great reputation for reducing stress, elevating moods, promoting sleep, and easing digestive distress, including gas and bloating. It’s also antibacterial, antifungal and antiviral, so lemon balm tea is a superb drink if you’re feeling under weather. Here’s how to make a homegrown brew.
Sore throat? Gargle with sage
With its antiseptic and antibiotic properties, sage makes an excellent tonic for sore throats, infected gums and mouth ulcers. It can also be used to calm the nerves and stimulate the brain.
Aloe vera: nature’s burn cream and skin beautifier
When it comes to lotions and potions, nothing says 100% natural like aloe vera. The squishy gel inside the plump leaves has anti-inflammatory and healing properties and can be used at home to treat burns (including sunburn), blisters, insect bites, cuts, rashes, eczema and psoriasis. It also makes a brilliant face mask and hair conditioner (check out our recipes).
Plant garlic
The shortest day may have passed, but you can still plant garlic now in the southern hemisphere. In fact, you can do so up until August. The main point is that garlic requires a decent winter chill to initiate bulbing. But if you still haven’t planted yours by August, don’t worry. Pop the bulbs in the fridge for a few weeks before planting out. Click through for more growing tips.
Grow thyme
Thyme is a breeze to grow, and it’s winter hardy, so you can pick leaves year-round. But make sure you pick the right thyme for your purposes. Creeping thymes are great to look at, but most are best kept out of the kitchen.
The classic culinary thyme is Thymus vulgaris, and it’s the favoured choice for casseroles and roasts. It has a rich, full flavour that doesn’t fade during cooking. But there are other thymes that are equally useful in the kitchen, including pizza thyme (Thymus nummularius), lemon thyme (Thymus citriodorus), orange thyme (Thymus citriodorus ‘Fragrantissimus’) and caraway thyme (Thymus herba-barona).
