Gardening through my
adventures, I have been introducing new plants in my rooftop garden. While most
of these are blooming perennials like roses, tuberoses, and lilies, I have been
trying out vegetable plants once in a while. The brinjal experiment last year
was quite a success. Apart from that, the chillies, that feature in my garden
almost every time, always give me some great results.
Herbs too have always
been part of my garden. Be it the curry leaf plant that I always have in my
garden for the culinary uses of the leaves. You might be knowing that curry
leaves are widely used in south Indian cuisines, and being someone who likes
south Indian cuisine quite a lot, it really makes sense for me to have an
important ingredient of this cuisine, rather than going without it. Apart from
curry leaf (Bergera koenigii) plant, I've got Tulsi (holy basil) plant as well.
It's much more important for religious regions. Beyond that, tulsi plant is
considered an important medicinal plant, as leaves of this plant possess many
medicinal properties.
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| Beautiful curry leaf
blooms. Looks like miniature lilies, isn't it? |
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| Beautiful curry leaf
blooms. Here's another bunch of those beautiful blooms. |
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| Fruits on the curry leaf plant. These will drop down and germinate, giving me more curry leaf plants. |
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| Fruits on the curry leaf plant. These will drop down and germinate, giving me more curry leaf plants. |
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| The holy basil (tulsi) plant. As far as I know, we have two varieties of these, one with green stems and green leaves, and another one with dark purplish tint to the stems, and this is the second one. |
I have, time and
again posted about the fennel plants, which again is an important herb, seeds
of which find an important in our culinary preparations. I, however like it for
its beautiful yellow coloured small blooms, which bloom in large clusters. Some
time back, in this summer, I arranged a bay leaf plant for my garden. The plant
was in some kind of shock having been travelled more than 1500 kilometres, and
being planted in a grow bag, 20 feets above ground. But of late, it seems to
have settled down, and has started showing signs of live. Again, leaves of the
Indian bay leaf (malabathrum), is widely used in our cooking for its strong
smell and flavour.
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| The bayleaf plant. It's looking better these days. |
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| The beautiful blooms of fennel. |
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| The beautiful blooms of fennel. |
Then recently, we
found something odd growing in one of the pots. This was something like some
really wide leaved grass, and luckily, it got spared being pulled out by the neck.
We let it grow, and it turned out to be turmeric. Do I need to tell you about
that too? Okay, turmeric too is widely used in Indian cuisine, and has been
proven to carry tonnes of medicinal properties. And then, mint has always been
a hot favourite. It has got many uses in our cuisine. And then, mint is known
to be a refreshing herb, and can be used to prepare refreshing drinks.
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| Turmeric plant |
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| Mint |
With these, the herb
collection that's there in my garden, at this time is over. I do grow some
seasonal herbs like coriander too, but that's something done in
winters. For now, I will wrap up. Will be back with something new, since, the
weather has turned somewhat good, it has started raining once in a while,
giving us Delhiites, much wanted relief from the scorching summer heat. And then,
the monsoon season is around the corner. That means, I will again have the
tuberoses blooming, and who knows, the lilies too might bloom this time around,
giving me a visual treat. I'll keep you guys posted with all of the happenings
in my garden. Till then, keep trying and HAPPY GARDENING!
Superb...
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