Which herbs fit together - in the pot and herb garden

• Herbs in the pot
  • Kitchen and salad herbs
  • Long naturalized
  • International kitchen
• Other aspects
  • fragrant oasis
  • medicinal herbs
• Herbs in the garden
  • Needs for the location
  • intolerances
  • Herb garden without work
• Herbs: varieties and purchasing

Herbs in the kitchen and in the garden are today a must, but only in the right composition really a pleasure. We show you who suits whom, with "matching compilation" having several aspects.

Herbs actually always go together in the pot because they can help you create the right environment. In the balcony box, it does not fit, and in the herb garden you usually have to build a bit to provide the right conditions for all herbs. However, herbs should also be put together appropriately for the intended use, that's what the article is about.

Herbs in the pot

An herb in a pot should usually be grown in the house, where the herbs have to cope with some typical shortage situations. So it is important to select frugal herbs that can cope with these shortages; otherwise, the compilation initially depends on the purpose of your "herb garden in the living room".

Kitchen and salad herbs

If you want to improve your daily normal diet with the herbal offer on the kitchen window sill, you also need a normal herbal mixture. The sets traditionally together once:

• Dill (anethum graveolens)
• Chives (Allium schoenoprasum)
• Parsley (Petroselinum crispum)
• Borage (Borago officinalis)

All together these are the classic kitchen and salad herbs of the Germans. Therefore, all local herbs that have long been freshly harvested and used together, they were always grown in the kitchen garden next to each other and can all grow together today.

Local herbs 1 of 3

These herbs grew in our latitudes in a kitchen garden somewhere near the house, no special needs, just earth and possibly not very much light. That's why they also thrive in the living room rather uncritically, not even in the brightest place on the windowsill, and you can still be lucky in the shade with chives, parsley and borage. For example, in a herbal rack above the sink, or placed in pots on the windowsill.

You need plain normal soil with a few nutrients, in the bottom of a little gravel o. Ä. As drainage (wet feet does not like land plant), regularly a little water and now and then a little tasteless organic fertilizer, if the harvest is going to be great. There are no likes or no affections, these herbs can all be pulled side by side and supplemented by "colleagues".

Long naturalized

Recently, there are more and more media reports about the tricks of the large, often international food companies, which unsettle the people. The regional traders, largely suppressed in recent decades, are already regrouping to provide us with real food, but that still takes some time. Until then, we have to eat too, and that is what causes many people to eat less processed food, so cook more.

When you get over the initial difficulties, cooking is fun and creative, and some completely forgotten food is rediscovered. Even with the native kitchen herbs, the search for lost treasures has been successful.

• Chervil, Anthriscus sylvestris, fast growing, yummy, uncomplicated, fine flavor, famous in "Fines Herbes" and Frankfurter Grüner Sauce
• Cress, Lepidium sativum, grows "unstoppable" in many varieties (the cress test is used to test what a plant could barely grow), can not only add sharpness to green smoothies, and is extremely healthy with its mustard oil glycosides "
• Lovage, Levisticum officinale, is even more forgotten and, in addition to Maggie's Wort, is also called Nut-herb (bringing a delicious hint of nutty celery to every cheesecake)
• You will not grow true caraway, Carum carvi, because of the seeds, but (surprise), this plant also develops fine leaves, which taste great in soups and salads, a kind of parsley-dill in mild. For people with a lot of kitchen imagination - even the cumin flowers are edible.
• Garlic, Allium sativum, has been in our kitchens for so long that it may be counted as naturalized. He also grows on the windowsill, and the green can be used just like the toes (stinks less)
• By potting, you can also get rid of the unwanted exhalations: Pull wild garlic, Allium ursinum, our formerly common forest garlic, the taste is spicy as garlic, does not cause odors and has little claims.

International kitchen

People with more kitchen ambition also need more herbs, eg. For example, all the southern herbs that are indispensable for seasoning our food:

• Basil, Ocimum basilicum, also as a perennial bush basil
• Savory, annual Satureja hortensis or perennial Satureja montana
• Tarragon, Artemisia dracunculus, indispensable where to cook well, sauce béarnaise, fines herbes
• Lavender, Lavandula angustifolia, can spice up quite surprisingly and can also be used in the wellness area
• Marjoram, Origanum majorana, not just sausage
• Oregano, Origanum vulgare, in many cultures popular seasoning and natural antibiotic
• Rosemary, Rosmarinus officinalis, part of the Provence herbal mixture and also surprisingly good in desserts
• Sage, Salvia officinalis, try a lot, eg. With dried tomatoes and white beans
• Thyme, thymus vulgaris, crust roast with thyme honey crust, baked potatoes with cheese and thyme

Southern herbs need sun, as much as possible, otherwise the fast-growing, rich-leaved basil benefits from good compost, but like tarragon, it can also cope with normal soil. Savory, marjoram, oregano, rosemary, sage and thyme need lean soil and a rather dry environment or attitude, lavender likes a little lime in the soil.

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You can gradually add any herb to this collection of herbs, after having asked the following questions:

• How much light is necessary
• How much water
• How many nutrients does the herb need?
• Preferences like clay, some lime etc.

If you love herbs, you should cut off the herb pot / shelf scissors in the head early, because so many wonderful-tasting and useful herb can decorate quite different spaces, such. B. a hyssop in a bucket or a nasturtium, in a traffic light or somewhere high.

Pot or balcony box
If you want to group the herbs into pots or boxes sorted according to needs and a little bit of use, you can usually put together the individual herbs with similar basic needs, most herbs are compatible. "Accidents" can happen here, if you put a slightly stronger seedling next to a weaker one, then Plant A - Plant B can ever dig up nutrients and water. But for the current season, you could just wait and see the plant growth more closely next time.

There are exceptions to self-incompatibility, and it has been learned through experience rather than substantiated knowledge that some herbs do not enjoy growing side by side; Information on this can be found below at "herbal compilation in the herb garden" .

Other aspects

Herbs can do more than just enrich the diet, and advanced herbalists can face a whole new set of challenges when putting together their herbs.

fragrant oasis

In the forest we are fine, because we absorb the positive ingredients of the trees through the air with the fragrance. The forest in the living room is bad, but there is certainly the possibility to hang "healthy scents" in the living room:

• thyme
• lavender
• peppermint
• basil
• rosemary

They just have to be mixed with consideration, even two very fragrant herbs like fennel and basil next to each other could cause more headaches than relaxation.

medicinal herbs

Who knows that 60 - 70% of the active substances in our medicines were derived from plants or the nature, has at home a few medicinal herbs, against headaches and even more for the supportive consumption with chronic illnesses.

These medicinal herbs are of course tailored to personal needs, only when this is done, they are put together according to growth needs.

Medicinal herbs are for example:

• borage
• peppermint
• thyme
• chamomile

Herbs in the garden

The just described herbal composition according to need groups / purposes in the herb garden is just as appropriate, but here the herbs are not for themselves in a pot, but next to each other in the earth. In terms of the composition of the herbs, two aspects are more important here than in the case of "individual keeping in a pot":

Needs for the location

The herbs can not be adjusted as in the pot for the plant / plant group, but a herb garden is just a piece of garden, usually with relatively uniform conditions in terms of climate and soil.

If you put the magnificently in the damp and also in the shadow thriving lovage in a dark corner and in a plane with the sun-drenched, but otherwise very frugal oregano, one of them will suffer. Because of this very problem, the herbal spiral was invented, a real "herbal" with different areas in different levels and different soils.

It does not have to be a spiral, of course, you can design different areas in different ways. You can take advantage of a natural slope (or create some artificial slopes).

You can gradually add any herb to this collection of herbs, after having asked the following questions:

• How much light is necessary
• How much water is absolutely necessary
• How many nutrients does the herb need?
• How much heat is absolutely necessary (when can the herb in the garden)

If you are already cultivating a few herbs from some parts of the world, you can get to the destination faster if you inquire about the origin of the newcomer and put him to his climate gentlemen. If you are fortunate enough to live in a family where not everything is perfect right away, you can simply look at the newcomer in a concentrated way and place it according to your feelings and lessons learned.

intolerances

Actually, herbs are something like the "underdogs of the plant world": Grow everywhere, often even in soils where there are hardly any nutrients, often enough do not migrate into the delicious stew, but get under the weed hoe, stewing in the sun, and then are not even really pretty - who grows so, is a lot used and usually thrilled in a cozy garden bed.

But there are a few herbs that are bad neighbors to themselves or other herbs, including:

• dill
• fennel
• wormwood

A good overview can be found in this table: Overview herbal intolerance

Herb garden without work

If you, as a fresh herb gardener, have just "planned the kitchen", you might want to save the whole game in the garden for the same season. You can grow herbs anyway, as a good preparation for the herb garden and without work. Buy a wild plant mix, it is ready assembled z. B. from the company Saaten Zeller, then you have your herbs in the garden:

• Common Yarrow (Achillea millefolium)
• Real marshmallow (Althaea officinalis)
• Common mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris)
• Cornflower (Centaurea cyanus)
• Black Knapweed (Centaurea nigra)
• Wild carrot (Daucus carota)
• Real buckwheat (Fagopyron esculentum)
• Fennel (Foeniculum vulgare)
• Alant (Inula helenium)
• Wild Mallow (Malva sylvestris)
• Quill mallow (Malva verticiliata)
• Alfalfa (Medicago sativa)
• White clover (Melilotus albus)
• Yellow clover (Melilotus officinalis)
• Tansy (Tanacetum vulgare)

Herbs: varieties and purchasing

The seeds of all common herbs are available in the spring in the supermarket and in the garden center. You do not have to go to much trouble with some common species, Allium schoenoprasum (chives), Anethum graveolens (Dill), Borago officinalis (borage) are only available in one species and at most three variants / cultivars.

With Petroselinum crispum (parsley) it gets even more exciting, as a species, there is only one "giganteum" variety, but many more varieties, as most people are aware of:

• Petroselinum crispum v. crsipum, normal leaf parsley
• Petroselinum crispum v. crispum, curly parsley, moss frill
• Petroselinum crispum v. radicosum, half- length root parsley
• Petroselinum crispum v. tuberosum, root or tuber parsley

So here is the search for the retailer, and most of our well-known herbs are available in many more varieties, organic seeds of very special or old herbal varieties and many types of herbs can now be found on the Internet and at several specialty providers.

Each rediscovered or new herb variety has slightly different stature heights, grows as a single plant in slightly different breadth and growth habit, and above all, each of these varieties develops their own flavor. Herbs are in, and for gourmets there is an endless amount of herbs to discover, you could be lucky on every beautiful little herbal market and find unusual culinary herbs.

By the way, this is far from over: by now, the most complete list of our plant species (the Plant List) currently lists 350, 699 botanically accepted plant species names, and you will find a much broader selection when you enter a herb generic name than yours.

Entering Ocimum basilicum will reveal 75 internationally accepted basil species, 18 newly discovered, yet unconfirmed species, and 292 synonyms by which these species are or were named (botanists are fond of plant names, making purchasing no easier).

By the way, in terms of compiling herbs, this little stimulus to help expert traders and species richness in our world brings you a lot. A passionate herb gardener will not only help you with unanswered questions about the basic concepts of herbal compilation just summarized, but will also let you get a taste of the "high art" and give you a taste of the art. For example, you can tell why you really need exactly this type of thyme for your Boeuf Bourguignon (and could plant the shallots with it).