Happy belated equinox

I’m a little late to the game but happy spring equinox everybody!

I don’t know about anyone else but, for me, this week has very much been a tulsi and rose sort of a week. By which I mean really f*****g hard! If I was fully stocked, I would have likely added some milky oat tops into the mix too but they seem to be so much trickier to get in the UK and I didn’t plan ahead. If anyone out there has a good supplier , pray, let me know.

So, due to my strange week, I haven’t really planned this post at all but I thought I’d offer a little something on the wonders of tulsi and rose tea and then focus on some of the positive things I’ve been up to, to mitigate the negative start.

Tulsi and rose tea (cover picture)

Tulsi and rose tea is likely my most regularly drank tea. I drink it when work is getting a bit too much, I drink it when life feels hard, I drink it whenever I need a pick-me-up and some fortitude to keep on chugging along with whatever task is at hand, but sometimes I just drink it in the morning and enjoy it’s familiar taste and consider the day to come.

Native to India, where it is considered sacred to the Hindu god Vishnu, tulsi (Ocimum tenuiflorum) is a powerful adaptogen, as well as having many other actions (such as being antibacterial, antiviral, antispasmodic and carminative, to name a few). I buy my tulsi from Organic Herbal Remedies here in the UK and I really can’t fault it at all. I would recommend buying more than you think you’ll need though, just to save on endless orders.

We all know rose (Rosa spp.) in one form or another. That beautiful smelling flower grown worldwide, given as a gift to show affection, used in skincare and even in food (high praise to whoever invented Turkish Delight by the way). But rose has many uses and benefits besides, though in this tea we’re really focussing on its nervine action. It is also specifically indicated for the emotional heart, so is a welcome addition in times of heartbreak, grief, needing self-love, etc. I like to think of the rose with it’s thorns when considering this – sure the flower is soft and seemingly vulnerable but those thorns are there for it’s protection. I get my rose from different places to be honest, with a small amount coming straight from the garden, some from Baldwin’s in London and some from Woodland Herbs in Glasgow, depending which other herbs I might be purchasing at the same time. I am yet to come across a bad supply of rose, either in petal or bud form.

I recommend mixing a batch up in advance and storing it as is, in which case, I work with two parts tulsi to one part rose and then use approximately 1 tsp per cup (I make a small pot and use about 3 tsp).

Life waffle

• I bought a stunt kite.
  Slightly random but I was watching some children flying theirs the other day and just felt like I needed some of that. One day there will be just the right amount of wind without rain for me to take flight.
• I dug up my angelica (Angelica archangelica) and turned some of the roots into a tincture.
  I know, I know, it is completely the wrong time of year for such things but the angelica was suffocating my rose and I had a sudden urge to pull out a pitchfork. Anyway, the smell that filled the kitchen was phenomenal and made me smile whenever I walked into the kitchen.
• I planted my wild strawberry plant.
  I plan to have lovely little strawberries to eat later in the year. Need I say more?
• I bought some mushroom-infused coffee.
  I don’t really drink coffee nowadays after too many horrendous cups at work finally forced me to kick the addiction but I’ve been considering trying one of these for some time. It makes for a pretty mellow cup which is probably for the best, having gone so long without but I definitely had a very productive day today. Whether that’s due to the coffee, who knows?

• I attended some sessions for the Herbal Entrepreneur Conference 2021.
  I learned my lesson from last year and bought the VIP pass, knowing I couldn’t attend all of the sessions live or catch up in 48-hours. So far I’ve been enjoying the sessions as much as last year. There’s a great range of speakers with different specialities and it’s a pleasure hearing each of them talk with such passion and conviction.
• I commissioned some amazing vases as gifts.
  Sure, one of those gifts is for myself but it 100% counts.