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Planting, Growing, and Harvesting Mint
Cooking Notes
Serious cooks generally prefer spearmint for savory dishes and peppermint for desserts. Try apple or orange mint for a delicate mint taste in fruit salads, yogurt, or tea. Mint lurks in the background in Middle Eastern salads, such as tabouli, and does well with lamb. It also goes with peas, zucchini, fresh beans, marinades for summer vegetables, cold soups, fruit salads, and cheese.
Tip! Make flavored ice cubes by freezing trays of strong mint tea, then use the ice cubes for your drinks!
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Sow the seeds just 1/8 inch deep, barely covering with fine soil, and keep moist. Seeds will germinate in 10 to 20 days. Mints are slow to develop during the first year, but be ready to fight them back the second year. If you’re worried about their growth, plant in their own bed!
Lovely article, thank you!
I was wondering if there was any more information regarding companion planting? I see that you stated to plant mint next to tomatoes and cabbage, but will mint do well alongside other plants? Why only tomatoes and cabbage?
Xx
Mint’s main feature is its potent smell, which is said to deter common pests such as cabbageworms and cabbage moths, ants, aphids, and flea beetles. Generally, mint can be planted in pots alongside any veggies that are affected by these pests, like peppers, broccoli and cauliflower, and other leafy greens.
For more about companion planting, see our articles on the topic:
Hi. Thank you so much for these articles, very helpful.
Over a year ago, myself an my wife planted a fruit tree and guild. The guild has many perennials from lavender to hibiscus, thyme, yarrow, sorrel and others, but also mint, spearmint, mountain mint.
I can find plenty of information online about planting a guild with perennials but nothing about what to do when fall and winter arrive...how to care?
Do I just leave the mint and others to die, fall and rot, or cut away the stalks for regrowth in Spring?
I would love if you could help or even point me in the direction of something online or some books for caring for a fruit tree guild through winter.
Thank you so much.
Stephen.
Creating a fruit tree guild is a wonderful way to promote biodiversity in a small space and to work permaculture into your garden. Generally, it’s recommended to allow nature to take its course and let the perennials die back themselves, as they will eventually break down and feed the surrounding soil. However, if the garden is planted very tightly together, you may want to cut and remove some of the larger perennials as they die back (like yarrow, for example) so that they do not end up suffocating out the others.
You should also keep an eye out for any signs of pests or disease鈥攆ungal or bacterial spots, mildew, pests, and so on鈥攁nd remove infected material from the garden. This helps to prevent it from building up in one location and perpetuating the disease in the following growing season.
I recently brought a peppermint plant indoors to be grown under artificial light, since I had to bring my succulents in anyway, and noticed its leaves have started to change from its normal green to more red/purple, is this an indication of too much or too little light, or completely unrelated?
you said stem anker. did you mean stem cancer?
stem canker
Stem cankers are patches of dead tissue that appear on a plant’s stem. The canker may be caused by an infection of bacteria, viruses, or fungi, and they generally expand slowly over time. Depending on the plant and the cause, stem cankers may be lethal to the plant.
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