Anyone else out there feeling like you’re printing money every time you harvest fresh herbs and flowers?
If I have a plan for them, I’ll store them accordingly.
If I don’t, I hang them up to dry or pack them with fat (butter or olive oil) and freeze.
Every time you trim basil, you coax it to make more basil.
Every time you harvest a cut-and-come-again flower like zinnia, you ask it to make more flowers.
You’re patting that little golden goose on the head and saying, “Keep it up.”
Even if it’s a tiny bundle of peppermint drying in my window, I think to myself, “That’s two more cups of peppermint tea I’m not going to have to pay for.”
In general, I don’t advocate gardening for the sake of saving money. You often won’t, and I believe the benefits stack up higher than a budget ledger prove.
That being said, things like fresh herbs and fresh flowers are far cheaper—and superior in quality—for your spice drawer, your tea tins and your vases.
It’s one lane of my kitchen garden I’m really doubling down on, favoring to give more of my limited space to things like lavender, rosemary, oregano, coriander, thyme, lemongrass, peppermint, sweet mint, chamomile and chives than to things like squash… because really, the yield is just so much more valuable… and they look lovely and smell divine.