Herb of the Year

I've been ordering lots of herbs this year as I do every year. We will of course order new varieties for our herb garden, maintained by the Janesville Area Herb Society, and plant them elsewhere around the gardens. This year we are also including many herbs in our "Smelly Garden" and our compact/ornamental edible garden. I've found some neat compact basils and all sorts of interesting herbs that I've not observed in the past. I thought I'd mention that the International Herb Association (IHA) has selected horseradish (Armoracia rusticana) as the 2011 Herb of the Year. The IHA also promotes the appreciation of all herbs during National Herb Week which is always the week preceeding Mother's Day weekend. Horseradish can be quite aggressive but many swear that growing their own horseradish is the way to go for the best fresh taste. Processing that root can be a laborious and pungent endeavor (you'll never forget it if you've done it!) and many of us may prefer to buy it in "jar form" from the grocery store. I remember my dad eating lots of horseradish and combining it with ketchup for anything that you would put ketchup on (which is a vast assortment of things for my dad...). The shot above was taken at the herb garden at Boerner Botanic Garden (Hales Corners, WI). I like the tropical look of horseradish but again, be wary of it's expanding girth over the years. I'm even more excited about the variegated form ('Variegata') seen to the left and below. When you purchase this variegated form, it may take two years to really get good variegation. It spreads too but our patch in the sunken garden has never become too oppressive and sure looks awesome with the fresh, spring growth. Check out www.iherb.org/articles/horseradish_in_depth.htm for some very good history of this herb as well as growing tips and usage information. We'll try to offer it at our spring sale (May 14 and 15) if we can track it down (both green leaf and variegated forms). The Janesville Area Herb Society will be doing a presentation at RBG on Thursday, August 4th at 7 pm on this Herb of the Year. See future details on the RBG website. I'm still on the mend after my sickness yesterday but will hopefully be full strength for the rest of the week. I go mobile tomorrow to Bristol, WI and Waukesha, WI to talk as part of an UW-Extension organized short course where I'll be talking about container gardening. The focus will be on larger containers for parks, etc. and it sounds like there will be a good turnout. I do the same gig on Friday in Milwaukee and Sheboygan. Thursday is our Garden Expo set-up day. It will be a crazy week/weekend.

Dr. Gredler was here most of the day painting and has started processing plant sale labels for Janice. We had a Garden Development Committee meeting this morning with Gary, Big John, Dick P, Dr. Gredler, Carrie, Joanne, Christine and Iza today. We also saw Urban, Vern and Dick H. It was frigid (although bright and sunny) today so we were all inside. Below are the flower buds of variegated horseradish (Armoracia rusticana 'Variegata') in early summer.