Herbilicious

I've come to the conclusion that almost every words just sounds better with "-ilicious" added to the end of it. Try it, it's fun.

If you recall, we said goodbye to our dear basil plant Fred last October. He made quite a few delicious batches of pesto that we enjoyed over the long winter months, but we soon ran out and very much missed little Fred and his basil-y goodness.

You could say even he was basilicious(!).

Once the weather started getting nicer this spring, it was a given that we would plant and raise Fred #2 to enjoy over the summer. We planted itty-bitty basil seeds, and within weeks we had some baby basil plants growing on the balcony!

Fast forward to a few weeks ago, and we have a full grown forest of basil out there now! That stuff seriously grows quickly.

We've already been able to make three batches of bruschetta (fyi, world's best recipe by yours truly to come) and use some leaves as a chopped up garnish for a few pasta dishes.

But! Not only do we have good, ol' basil growing, but we also have lemon basil:

Mint:

And chamomile:

I have yet to do anything with the other three herbs, but I'm thinking the mint and chamomile would make for some fabulous tea. Or perhaps some basil lemonade with the lemon basil??

Anyone else with a little herb garden? What have you used the herbs for?

The Great Basil Harvest 2010

A few months ago, Scot and I decided that we would try to be domestic and start a little herb garden. Not the easiest thing when you live on the 11th floor of an apartment building, but we have a balcony that gets decent sun, so we figured we'd give it a go.

We were pretty overzealous at first: we planted seeds for parsley, cilantro, dill, oregano, thyme, basil, and catnip. Only the last two survived. And I only accidentally almost made pesto with catnip once, thankyouverymuch.

We ended up having basil from both a pre-grown plant as well as some that we raised since it was a wee little seed (we'll call him Fred). We knew we were successful when Fred started to grow and expand, as such:

Little Fred eventually took over almost the whole flower box, and we had bruschetta and pesto galore all summer long. All for like 2 bucks! However, as the summer came to an end, so did Fred's glory days. No more was he growing and blossoming like he used to, and his leaves started drying up. So we decided we would hang on to what we had and harvest our dear basil.

Now, what to do with that colander of yumminess? Make mad amounts of pesto and freeze it for the winter, of course!

No, we do not freeze our cat food. We just reduced, reused, and recycled the box!

So dear old Fred will feed us many more times in the upcoming months. We left a few leaves still on the plant to see if it lasts or grows any more, in which case I can make some bruschetta at least once more before winter! As for the pesto, I'm already thinking of meals I can make with it.. I'm thinking on pasta, on pizza, on mini turkey sandwiches. Any other pesto-y ideas or recipes??