We had a great time growing our first real garden this year. I felt a bit sad to have to clean out most of the garden last week before the snow hit. Yes, we’ve already had a few snowfalls this year. Fortunately, I took advantage of a sunny day in October to harvest the last of our herbs. I just love fresh herbs and growing our own has been a very satisfying experience. I wanted to savor every last bit of them so I decided to dry them. I’ve talked to a friend about her method and did a little online research and ended up coming up with my own approach.
After cutting the herbs, I put them into bundles and tied the ends with twine.
Don’t they look pretty? They smelled so wonderful!
Then I hung each bundle upside down in a brown lunch bag and tied it at the top.
Feel free to sing a little song here… I couldn’t resist!
Using the bag approach makes it so the herbs are drying upside down in a dark and dry environment. It’s better than hanging them from the ceiling because the bag catches any loose herbs that drop. I’ve tried this a few times throughout the summer and it works out really well. After about 2 weeks, the herbs are completely dried out and then they can be crumbled into containers to store. You can use a mortar & pestle if you want to, but I found it easiest to just rub them between my fingers. That way, I’m able to focus just on the leaves and not get the stems mixed in.
It makes me happy to put these into little containers to save for the winter. It’s just a bonus that I got to use my label maker.
You know what else is cool? All of the photos in this post were taken with my iPhone. I love having a camera in my pocket all day long!
I’m already dreaming of next year’s garden.
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