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Nothing beats the satisfaction of having a nice cup of tea – except maybe sipping a custom blend you grew and harvested from your very own garden. The Peninsula is suitable for cultivating many edible plants that can be used for delicious and nutritious teas, according to local garden experts.
When it comes to comparing homegrown tea to packaged teas from the grocery store, “you can absolutely taste the difference,” Nia Combs, the edible-garden coordinator for Gamble Garden in Palo Alto, which will host an herbal tea workshop Feb. 13, said. “The quality is a lot better than anything from a tea bag you’ll get from the store. When you’re able to harvest the leaves yourself and dry them yourself, you’re getting all of that flavor in your tea.”
According to Jennifer Lee Segale, homegrown plants for teas can be an attainable and enjoyable goal, no matter the size of your garden space. Segale is the founder of the Half Moon Bay-based landscape design and consulting company Wildflower Farms. In addition to helping clients cultivate the gardens of their dreams, she also has a small organic farm, growing lavender, saffron and other herbs for teas, and is the CEO of Wildflower Farms’ sister company Garden Apothecary, which offers a line of botanical teas and skincare products.
Tea plants that grow well on the Peninsula
Lavender, with its lovely flowers, soothing scent and delicate flavor, is a staple of cozy bedtime rituals and a great choice for many Peninsula yards. It’s drought-tolerant and also works well in pots.
“You can pick lavender year-round for teas, simmer pots and skin care, all that stuff,” Segale said.
Lavender is generally pretty easy to grow but does require full sun.
“You want to place it in a place that has the most sun you can get. It really needs good drainage; it can’t be in an area with poor soil,” she said. “It tolerates a lot of different microclimates and soil substrates, it’s a very flexible plant, but it doesn’t want to be left in a very boggy, shady area.”
Check out some recommended herbal tea blends from Gamble Garden
WINTER BLENDS
“Cozy Blanket”
1 part osmanthus
1 part safflower
½ part olive leaf
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“Mint Chocolate”
2 parts chocolate mint (or any peppermint)
2 parts cacao nibs
1 part rosemary
½ part rooibos
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“Apple Pie”
2 parts apple
1 part cinnamon
1 part rooibos
1 part root beer hyssop
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“Warm Night”
2 parts pear
1 part cinnamon
½ part rooibos
½ part osmanthus
1 cardamom pod
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“High C”
1 part hibiscus
1 part rose hips
½ part calamondin
¼ part cinnamon
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SUMMER BLENDS
“Calm & Steady”
2 parts lemon balm
1 part chamomile
1 part rose
1 part peppermint
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“Soothing Sleep”
2 parts dried chamomile
1 part lemon balm
½ part rose petals
½ part lavender
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“Focus Tea”
1 part rosemary
½ part mint
½ part lemon balm
¼ part basil
¼ part thyme
¼ part lavender
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“Hibiscus Refresher”
1 part hibiscus
1 part yerba buena
½ part lemon peel
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“Hibiscus Herbal Cooler”
1 part hibiscus
1 part chamomile
¼ rose hips
¼ cinnamon
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“Hibiscus Bliss”
1 part lemon verbena
1 part hibiscus
1 part scented geranium
1 part lavender leaf
There are a lot of lavender varieties to choose from and her personal favorite is Grosso Lavender, known for its high oil content.
“Lavender does not want to be fussed with too much. It doesn’t want fertilizer, it doesn’t want a lot of digging around the roots, it just wants to be left alone for the most part,” she said. “You prune lavender when you feel like it; there’s no wrong way.” In addition to picking the flowers, including chopped lavender stems and leaves in tea blends helps maximize the nutrient compounds and lovely scents. It’s known for its calming properties, which Segale said are backed by clinical research.
In general, tea made with flowers has a milder taste while leaves can taste similar but provide a more intense punch of flavor. With lavender, for example, while most people are likely familiar with the gentle, creamy taste of the flowers, “the leaf on lavender is very refreshing and stronger,” Combs said.
Another favorite choice for tasty and healthful homegrown teas is mint – despite its reputation for being invasive.
“Mint is so incredible, whether it’s a spearmint or a peppermint or a chocolate mint … there are so many mint cultivars now,” Segale said. “It’s such a giving, intuitive herb to grow that it’s crazy not to grow it. I’m not afraid of it spreading a bit. It’s not difficult to remove it from the garden; I think that’s a myth.” For those who fear it taking over, though, mint also does great in containers.
Chamomile is also prized for its calming properties and makes an excellent option for a relaxing tea.
“Chamomile grows pretty well in this area,” Combs said. “You can get probably half a pound of chamomile flowers from a few plants. It’s really nice and soothing.”
According to Segale, gardeners can treat chamomile the way they would a California wildflower; it’s surprisingly hardy.
“It can tolerate all types of soils, a lot of different types of exposure,” she said. “Even though we know it as a very gentle little herb and a cute little flower, it’s actually a really rugged robust perennial.”
If you have access to citrus trees, try dehydrating the peels of the fruits and adding them to teas. Other plants providing a citrus-like flavor include lemon balm, lemon verbena and lemon mint. Various basils and thymes, too, can provide that perfect zing of citrus taste.
“There are a lot of things you can do in that kind of flavor category,” Gamble’s garden director Corey Andrikopoulos said.
Flowers that make flavorful teas
Roses are known for their beauty and scent in the garden but they’re also great for tea making and other edible endeavors. Combs advised looking for varieties that are especially fragrant and produce nice rose hips (the fruit of the plant).
‘HERBAL TEA PARTY’ WORKSHOP: LEARN TIPS FOR TEA GARDENS
For those who want hands-on guidance on growing a tea garden, Combs is leading an “Herbal Tea Party” workshop at Gamble Garden on Feb. 13, during which paraticipants can taste herbs, create custom blends and learn more about growing and preparing plants for tea. At the class, participants will take a “deep dive” learning about five herbs, and are also invited to check out the plants growing at Gamble Garden.
“I love rose-hibiscus tea,” Segale said, particularly in iced form. “It’s so tangy and full of vitamin C.”
“Hibiscus is a really nice one to grow. It’s pretty prolific if you can get it into the right area. It likes sun and water,” Combs said. “That’s one I use a lot in our tea blends, either an accent taste or as the main taste.”
Beloved for its gorgeous color, butterfly pea flower is “considerably harder to grow” than some of the others, but leads to dreamy blue-hued teas. “That’s a good one to grow in the summer,” Combs said.
From saffron to safflower, and even some caffeinated options
Segale grows saffron and said it can thrive here, although she doesn’t recommend it for gardening newbies. “Saffron is one of the world’s most expensive spices because of how labor intensive it is to harvest. Anyone can try, but not everyone can successfully grow it,” she said. The fall-blooming plants – in the crocus family – “like a lot of nutrients but they’re fussy about how you get them,” she said.
At Gamble, Combs and Andrikopoulos recommend safflower for an attractive summer bloom that has a similar taste to saffron but is easier to grow.
“People call it the ‘poor man’s saffron,'” Combs noted. Gamble has also been growing lemongrass, and “we’ve started to experiment with sugar cane and natural sweeteners you can grow in this area as well,” Andrikopoulos said.
Andrikopoulos is fond of tea made from olive leaves, which surprises some people.
“The leaves from an olive tree create a very floral, light tea. It’s not at all what you’d expect,” he said. “It’s a tree that you can find around that’s very easy to harvest from.”
Osmanthus is popular in ornamental landscaping for its fragrance, but it has a nice mellow flavor as well. One of Combs’ favorite teas is a blend of osmanthus, olive leaf and safflower. Salvias, such as pineapple sage and culinary sage, are other tea favorites at Gamble Garden.
While black tea plants (Camellia sinensis) can be grown in our region, the harvesting and processing techniques are too involved for many home gardeners, Segale said. Gamble Garden has been experimenting with a few other caffeinated plants. “Yerba mate (a South American herb often used for tea) is a small shrub that grows really well here,” Andrikopoulos said, as does yaupon holly, a North American species similar to yerba mate.
Garden beds and beyond
Segale noted that the possibility of making teas from plants you can find in your yard is not limited to a formal garden. Many native plants, including redwoods, have edible properties (check out a list of California native medicinal plants from Yerba Buena Nursery to learn more).
You may have learned the hard way in childhood that nettle leaves release stinging chemicals when touched, but nettle also makes for a refreshing tea full of potential health benefits (harvest wearing gloves and long sleeves; steeping in hot water neutralizes the leaves’ sting).
“Nettle’s an incredible herb. Everyone should be growing nettle. It’s also so delicious,” Segale said.
When it comes time to prepare your tea, the details are up to you, including any combinations or additions you may wish to make.
“Something nice to do is just experiment and use your intuition on it. Any recipe you see is just someone making up something that worked for them,” she said.
Combs concurred. “Why I love (making homemade tea) is the potential for play. You can play around with so many different herbs and flavors and it’s pretty rare that it comes out poorly, at least in my experience,” she said.
The basics are simple: Bring water to a boil, take it off the heat, then add it to a handful of fresh leaves or a small scoop of dried loose-leaf tea in a teapot with a strainer and steep for no more than 5 minutes, which will typically provide about 3 to 4 cups of tea.
Andrikopoulos also noted that steep time can depend on how finely the material is chopped up.
“Herbal tea can steep a bit longer than black tea without getting those bitter notes but eventually they will come out,” he said.
Participants in Gamble Garden’s class will be working with dried teas. Drying herbs for tea can be accomplished by bundling and hanging them in cool, dry spots (“there’s usually a rack of hanging herbs somewhere in my office,” Andrikopoulos said) then, once completely dry, they can be stored in airtight containers for up to a year or so.
“Darkness is usually best for the longevity of the teas,” he said.
Gamble also has a dehydrator that is sometimes used for drying tea materials, but at home, things like citrus peels can be dried by putting them in the oven at low temperatures.
When working with fresh, just-picked plants instead of dried ones, Combs recommends steeping for a bit longer to allow the hot water to really penetrate and extract the flavor, while for a medicinal brew, Segale said an even longer steep time would be needed (consult with a qualified herbalist in that case). And remember that plants shrink up quite a lot when dried, so much less material is needed when brewing tea fresh.
No matter whether you have one small potted plant or an extensive outdoor space, there’s likely a form of tea gardening that will work for you.
“I think the fun thing about tea gardens, or growing herbs for tea is, people have an opportunity for evaluating their lifestyle and their needs, whether that’s physical or emotional,” Segale said. “It’s this really beautiful thing growing in your garden – big or small, whether it’s a patio or big landscape – it’s something you can interact with in this very cool way. I totally believe we should be growing our own medicine.”
Gamble Garden’s “Herbal Tea Party” will be held at 1 p.m. on Feb. 13 at 1431 Waverley St., Palo Alto; $65; gamblegarden.org/event/herbal-tea-party-valentines.
More information on Segale’s work is available at wildflowerfarms.org and gardenapothecary.com. Instagram: @wildflowerfarms_ and @gardenapothecary
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