Photo courtesy of shawnbot at Flickr.com.
One of the great things about most herbs is that they’re easy to grow organically — in fact, in some cases (for example, rosemary and the various mints), you might have more trouble keeping them from growing once you get started! In large part, this is because many traditional herbs originally come from the Mediterranean region, where rocky, poor soils are the norm. Give them a good soil and they’ll grow like weeds. This is a good thing, because it leaves you with plenty of herbs to work with.
Herbs come in three basic flavor types: strong-flavored herbs like rosemary, winter savory, and sage, which can set the tone of a dish; accent herbs like dill, basil, mint, marjoram, and thyme, which add accent to the flavor; and blending herbs, such as parsley, summer savory and chives, that work fine alone, but are also good choices for multi-herb blends. Fortunately, all these are easy to grow, so they make great starting points for the inexperienced herb gardener.
Herbs can also be classified by their growth patterns. For example, annuals grow one season and die; examples mentioned above include basil and summer savory. Biennials take two years to grow, blooming only in the second year before dying; parsley is an example. Finally, perennials will come back every year, if allowed to self-seed. Marjoram, dill, thyme, chives, and winter savory are all perennials.
Looking for some easy herb kits to get started growing herbs? These grow right in your kitchen or windowsill! See the Home Window Garden Kit Set, Windowsill Kitchen Herb Garden, and Aerogrow Indoor Kitchen Garden. There is more helpful information on how to grow kitchen herbs and perennials in our whole store section on gardening books.
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