Fiona and Hugh Osborne explore why herbs are such a valuable commodity to the smallholder.
For centuries the value of black pepper was fixed at weight for weight with pure gold! Spices at that time travelled a long and difficult route by pack animals and sailing ships with journeys of incredible duration. Even today people describe Saffron as worth more than gold (it isn’t now but it certainly is a very expensive spice). Given that spices were (and are) so expensive it’s reasonable to wonder why they were so sought after. For us its simple, herbs and spices are key to making the dishes that we most enjoy, from Pad Thai to Marinara sauce and frankly we simply do not want to do without them. Our smallholding really doesn’t make us rich, so we must make every pound work for us. Buying spices from a supermarket is expensive. A little branded pot of dried bay leaves costs 60p a gram (or £600 a kilo)! Our bay tree is over 3 metres high and must contain many, many kilos of leaves. Should we be guarding it? Many of the herbs and spices that we need are easy to grow in good quantities.The ones that we need for some of our favourite Italian dishes such as Marinara, Bolognese and home-made pizzas (rosemary, thyme, oregano, sage etc.) are perennial, drought tolerant and very happy in pots. We tend to grow them in odd corners that don’t really work for a large crop since we must press every corner into productivity. We use them fresh for most of the year, but a few bundles tied up in a shed dry naturally and ensure that we have plenty for the Winter. These herbs really do save us a great deal as “Italian mixed herbs” cost £164 a kilo. If we are honest, with some ingenuity, there is another big saving to be had that relates to producing our own herbs and spices.
After a day on the smallholding we are often very tired and very hungry, and the call of the takeaway dinner is strong! But by growing what we need and bulk preparing things such as rice (you knew that fried rice must be cooked with day old rice right?) we can genuinely produce a meal better and quicker than getting one from our local takeaway. By using our own chicken (6 to 8 portions per bird) and using our own eggs, veg and spices, the cost is under a pound a portion.
VARIETY IS THE SPICE OF LIFE
Whilst we would love to claim that money saving is the main reason for producing our own herbs and spices (and yes, we sometimes do, but don’t tell anyone), there are other reasons that probably started us growing spices. One of the main reasons is that where we live, we really don’t have great access to all the spices that we want. A great example of lack of choice are chillies. Our local supermarket keeps, at best, half a dozen varieties but often only has three on the shelf. Sources disagree but some say 3,000 to 4,000 varieties exist and other say more than 50,000. By growing from seed, we get to use some fantastic varieties that are simply not available to us in the shops. We grow a general cooking variety called Ohnivec.Ohnivec chillies are massive (around 8inches long) and can be picked and frozenin a Ziploc bag. Once frozen it’s easy to take them out of the bag and chop them(still frozen) and add then to a dish, whichmakes them very low effort.
This article extract was taken from the November 2024 edition of The Country Smallholder. To read the article in full, you can buy the issue here.
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