Pineapple Sage - one of the most delicious and useful herbs

I first heard about Pineapple Sage (Salvia elegans) on the internet somewhere and I was both intrigued and skeptical.  Everyone who wrote about growing or eating this plant raved about how great it is.  I wanted to try some but did not want to pay a fortune for one through some mail order and then find it did not smell like pineapple, or that it smelled of pineapple but the pineapple smell was overpowered by the smell of sage.  I was lucky enough to find a small plant for sale in a shop somewhere and was able to smell it before buying it.  It smelled delicious, just like sweet pineapple.  After smelling it I had to buy one and try and grow it.  I am happy to say that it was simple to grow and performed rather well even in my harsh climate.

Pineapple sage flowers are sweet and delicious, just like the leaves

Pineapple Sage is quite possibly my favourite herb.  Many herbs are meant to smell like something, and they do if you use your imagination and wish really hard, but pineapple sage is different.  Other things smell different depending on where or how they are grown, how much water they are given or even the time of day that you smell them, chocolate mint is a prime example of this.  Other herbs have faint scents, or they have the scent of its name sake but it has another smell that overpowers it.  Pineapple sage actually smells like pineapple.  It really does.  It is not a faint pineapple smell that also has a sage smell overpowering it, it smells strongly of pineapple and nothing else.

Pineapple sage, like many of the vegetables that are eaten in Australia, is native to Central and South America.  It is less hardy than regular sage, frost knocks it around a bit if not protected, and it needs a little more water than regular sage, but it is still worth growing.  I grow some in the garden, mulch it well and hope that when the tops get burned off by frost that the roots will survive and re-sprout in Spring.  As well as growing it in the garden I always have one or two in pots, that way if we do happen to get an especially hard frost that kills off the garden grown plants I still have one in a pot to start over with when the weather warms up again.  It is simple to propagate via cuttings, but they only seem to take for me during the cooler weather.

I love pineapple sage, after reading about it on the internet it seems that I am not alone in my love for this plant.  I would grow it simply to smell as I walk and brush past it.  Water is scarce out here so I would struggle trying to justify growing a plant that simply smells nice.  Luckily it is not just a nice smelling ornamental, the whole plant is edible and useful in a number of ways.

Both the leaves and flowers of this versatile plant are edible, the leaves are used to flavour meat, poultry and other main meals, it is used in 'herbal tea', used for sorbets as well as a large range of desserts.  The flowers can be added to drinks, jellies, jams, desserts and fruit salad.  My kids and I like to make 'tea' by steeping the leaves in hot water and adding some honey or sugar.  Even my eldest son Igloo, who is rather picky about drinking such things loves the smell and the taste of pineapple sage tea.  Igloo is trying to convince me to let him grow 100 pineapple sage plants in his little vegetable garden, perhaps we will start with one and see how he goes.

Pineapple sage is meant to deter some pest insects, so I grow a few in amongst the vegetables in the garden.  To be honest I do not know if it makes any real difference, but nothing seems to grow any worse by having pineapple sage next to it and it is good to have a few extra plants.  By hiding it in amongst the vegetables they seem to be slightly safer from children who love to steal the leaves to eat them or do whatever it is that kids do with nice smelling leaves.

Pineapple sage grows well in a pot or in the ground

Pineapple sage leaves are a nice shade of green, in Autumn to Winter it will flower with beautiful red flowers.  These flowers smell as delicious as the leaves and are often visited by honey bees and several other pollinators.  We have seen honey bees as well as nine different species of native bees on the pineapple sage flowers, they simple adore it.  By flowering in Autumn and Winter they provide food for pollinators and beneficial insects in a time when traditionally they do not have a lot of food available in this area.  If you can grow it in a protected spot where the frosts will not burn it you will have it flowering most of the way through winter.  This means that come Spring you have a large number of pollinators and predatory insects already living in the garden ready to pollinate flowers and take care of any insect pests that may be around.

According to the internet pineapple sage is extensively used in Mexican traditional medicine, especially for the treatment of anxiety, depression, stomach aches, evening out blood sugar and for lowering of blood pressure.  I can't comment on how effective it is, but Igloo does seem a lot calmer and happier after he has drank some pineapple sage tea.

I have seen a golden leaf form of pineapple sage, apparently it is the same as regular pineapple sage but looks a bit prettier.  Some day I hope to track it down and try to grow it as well, but for now I am happy with the regular pineapple sage.

If you have never grown pineapple sage you should try it. Your kids will thank you for it.

Tree Onions

Tree Onions

Tree Onions are also known as Egyptian Walking Onions or Topset Onions.  They are an old heirloom vegetable dating from back to at least the 1850's but their exact history prior to that has apparently been lost.  Originally thought to be Allium cepa var proliferum but now we know that they are a interspecific hybrid between Allium cepa (the common onion) and Allium fistulosum (bunching onion).

Apparently tree onions used to grow in every backyard vegetable garden in the past, but recently they have fallen out of favor and have all but disappeared in Australia.  Not surprisingly they are not well suited to mass mechanical production, so it is unlikely that you will find them in the supermarket, but they are very well suited to the home grower.

Bulbils on a flower stalk which have sent up a stalk of their own

How to grow tree onions

 I have put some notes on how to grow them here.  Basically they grow the same as any other onion, but are a lot hardier and more forgiving if things do not go well.  They prefer a moist but well draining soil with plenty of nutrients and no competition from weeds, but will survive pretty much anywhere that is not too wet.  Raising the pH of the soil is helpful for any onion, this can be done by adding ash from the fireplace or buying some lime.  I have been told to harvest the bulbs when the stalks dry down, but this may or may not happen.  We harvest after flowering when the bulbs look larger, or whenever the bulb looks large enough to bother digging it up.  Sometimes in late summer I stop watering them so that they dry down for me, this seems to work.

Tree onions in less than ideal conditions

How to multiply tree onions

Tree onions reproduce vegetatively, do not  set viable seed and will not cross pollinate any other type of onion you may be growing.  As they reproduce vegetatively they are stable and will always grow true to type, as such they are one of the very few hybrids that I will bother growing.  Just like all the other perennial vegetables I grow, they just keep doing their thing year after year just as long as I do not eat all of them.

Tree onions are kind of like potato onions in that they are edible perennial onions that can divide underground.  The bulbs are a little larger than potato onions, and they do not divide as much underground, and the leaves are much larger than potato onions so they are easy to tell apart.  The underground bulbs of the tree onions normally grow to around the size of a ping pong ball.

They then grow small onion bulbs, called bulbils, on top of the flower stalk.  These small bulbils sometimes then send up a flower stalk of their own which grows more smaller bulbils.  This strain sometimes produces some real flowers as well, but they wither and drop quickly as all the energy is directed to the growing bulbils.

Unfortunately the flowers are only around briefly and only on a few flower stalks, I am always busy when they are around so I have not had a good look at them.  I would be curious to know if tree onions display cytoplasmic male sterility or if it would be possible to remove the bulbils and get the flowers to set viable seed.  If they could produce seed (even with a fair amount of intervention on my behalf) I would love to try and grow some out and see if I could produce some new varieties of tree onions.  But that is a project for Future Damo as I have a lot of other things going on that are more important at the moment.

The bulbils normally reach the size of a marble or a pea as the climate is so harsh here, I have seen them far larger when grown in more mild climates.  If the bulbils touch the soil they grow roots surprising fast.  When I have broken some of the bulbils off and planted them they always have roots by the following morning.  The roots of tree onions grow deep, far deeper than you would expect from such a small plant and certainly a lot deeper than any other onion I know of. 

Tree Onion bulbils just starting to grow

What Tree Onions are used for

The entire plant is edible, we use the bulbs in any recipe that calls for onion, if eaten straight away they can be a little insipid, if stored for a while they tend to taste a lot stronger.  The green parts can replace spring onions (we generally use the Everlasting onions for this though), and I am told that the bulbils are good pickled but am yet to try that myself.

The bulbils can be picked before they sprout and stored for many months, so far I don't bother doing this and just plant them when I find time, if I don't find time they plant themselves and I just transplant them when I get around to it.  The underground bulbs are meant to store for up to 18 months, I can't comment on this as I have not tried to store any because we just dig them up to eat as needed.  That is the beauty of perennial vegetables, many of them do not need to be stored and can simply be dug up, broken off, pulled out, or cut down and cooked when they are needed.

As well as being edible, tree onions are a garden curiosity that always attract comments from people who see them.  Children love to grow tree onions even if they have no desire to eat them.

Small tree onion bulbils, they grow far larger than this

Tree onions are very hardy!

Tree onions are very hardy little plants, they have survived drought, flood, severe heat, and hard frosts here and still gone on to produce a decent crop. They are pretty much impossible to kill by mistake.  Last year I lost most of my regular onions (as well as potato onions and a bunch of other things) to the drought and crazy heat, but the tree onions were happy, I put that down to their deep roots.  They can also be grown in pots, the roots seem to either go through the drainage hole into soil below, or the roots stop growing if the pot is off the ground and they they hit air.  If the pot is too small they tend to get very root bound and survive, but they do not often end up giving a large crop.  Even though they are very productive and hardy I don't think they pose a weed threat at all.  If you do not want any more it is simple to remove flower stalks, if you miss some and they happen to touch the soil and grow they are simply to pull up.  If any parts are left in the soil they do not tend to grow unless they have part of the base plate attached to a piece of bulb.

It is too dry for grass and weeds to survive, but tree onions go on strong

They are the cold hardiest of the onions and will survive in frozen ground for quite a long time.  As well as being productive little survivors they are unusual enough to be grown in a children's garden.  I have taught children who do not like onions, or any vegetables, beg me to let them grow these purely as a fun oddity.  I see that as a great way to teach kids about growing food.  Tree onions are very forgiving and will survive and produce at least some food even in the most neglected children's vegetable garden.

I first started growing tree onions when I was barely a teenager, I was fascinated by them, the thought of eating the underground bulb and replanting a small aerial bulb appealed to me.  Unfortunately I lost them when I left home, it took me a few years but I am glad that I was eventually able to track them down again.

I do sell tree onions from time to time on my For Sale page.

Antechinus

When we first moved here there were a lot of antechinus in the area.  They are a small, native, carnivorous marsupial.  They look similar to a large mouse or a small rat, but they are ferocious and they eat meat!  I wanted to show the kids what they looked like up close so I caught this one and put in in a bug catcher.  The kids had a look and then I let it go, it climbed up a tree and disappeared into the roof.

my Antechinus friend

Then a mouse plague struck the area, the largest plague since the 1980's.  It probably took 3 or 4 weeks of everyone in the area complaining about mice before we even saw our first mouse.  I am pretty sure the local antechinus population was large enough that they were eating out all the mice before they could get to my house, which was great.  Then the mice numbers eventually got too large for too long that they were everywhere.  People were having mice eat the wiring in their cars.  It was disgusting.

Eventually the mice started to get in the house and chew through electrical wiring in the roof.  After we could not take it any longer I started to put out traps and eventually started to bait them.  I was killing heaps of mice each night.  Unfortunately I was also occasionally trapping antechinus, they are tougher than a mouse so I was able to set them free and hope that they were not too injured.  Judging by the way they ran off I am guess that they mostly were not too hurt by the experience.

When the mice eventually subsided there were no more antechinus.  Normally we would see them hopping around eating moths and beetles, but all was quiet.  I had a bad feeling that they had died from eating too many sick poisoned mice.  It is a horrible feeling to think that perhaps you have killed off all of them...

Then the other day Tracey came home and found a dying antechinus under the car port.  This is great news!  Male antechinus die after the breeding season around this time of year, so finding a dying male is a sign that they are still around.  Hopefully they can return to their previous numbers and get back to protecting the place from mice.

while the picture is far from convincing, this is a male antechinus

Yacon - the world's most civilised vegetable

Yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolius formerly known as Polymnia sonchifolia) is a perennial root vegetable from South America.  

If you have never eaten yacon then you are missing out on something truly special. 

When Tracey asked our five year old to describe yacon he said: "They taste like apple. They look like a tube and grow underground like a potato. The leaves feel like a soft blanket."  To be honest I think that is as good a description as any.

How I first grew yacon

I read about yacon years ago on the Lost crops site and eventually tracked down a small rhizome to buy over the internet.  I spent a bit of money to get yacon and had no idea if it would grow for me or even if I would like it.  You plant yacon in spring, then you wait as it grows happily, if you have frosts it is best to let it die down over winter before harvest.  After planting it I waited patiently as it grew, still never having tasted it, all the while tempted to dig up a small root to try but trying to be patient so the plant could do its thing properly.  The yacon grew about waist high and looked nice, towards the end of the growing season it dropped a few leaves and looked a bit shabby.  The yacon then grows a small yellow sunflower like flower some years, unfortunately they require more than one clone in order to set viable seed and as far as I am aware there is only one yacon clone in Australia.

Yacon flowers

Then winter came, I was very excited, but the frosts did not kill off the tops so I waited until we had a hard frost as frost apparently makes the roots sweeter.  We then had a hard frost, and the yacon looked a little burned but overall was not too bothered, even though it does not look like it yacon is a pretty hardy plant.  After a few hard frosts the tops eventually succumbed to the cold.  I carefully dug up the large and brittle tubers and tried one, I liked it but it was nothing special.  The yield was amazing, from the one tiny rhizome that I initially planted I ended up with a dozen much larger rhizomes and a bucket full of large tubers, but if the taste was not great I did not want to use the space on them regardless of the yield.  Everything I had read said that if you leave yacon for a few weeks after digging it up it gets sweeter, so I waited for a few weeks for the tubers to sweeten, I then tried another one, I loved it!  

I wish that yacon was more readily available in Australia, even if the plants were more available for people to grow at home it would be great, this is why I started to sell plants.  I am rather fond of perennial vegetables, once you plant them you pretty much will have them forever.

Yacon, note the light brown edible tuber and the purple propagative rhizome

How to grow yacon

I have included some growing notes here that describes things a bit more clearly.  Yacon are interesting plants to grow, they pretty much look after themselves, they are hugely productive, and they are perennial.  From what I have read it can grow and be harvested all year in frost free places, apparently without frost you just wait an extra couple of days after harvest to let it sweeten before eating it.

I have never heard of anyone who has grown yacon complain of any pest or disease that affects the plants.  Yacon seems not overly picky about soil conditions, planted in rich moist soil it gives the highest yields, but it still gives a decent yield on poor soil with minimal water.  Yacon prefers full sun but will also provide a decent yield in part shade, it is well suited to growing under trees to utilise an otherwise wasted space.  One thing that yacon does not like is rocks and stones in the soil, the tubers will still grow and give a large and delicious yield but they will be misshapen due the pressure exerted upon them from the stones etc in the soil.

Unlike jerusalem artichokes to which yacon is related, yacon poses no weed threat, it grows well yet it remains civilised by not taking over the vegetable garden, in fact other plants seem to grow better when yacon is grown near them.  Yacon exudes inulin and other sugars from its roots which attracts and feeds earth worms as well as a host of other beneficial soil life.  I am told that yacon is readily colonised by mycorrhizae which promote plant growth in a number of ways.

Purple Yacon rhizomes ready to be divided and planted

Yacon is edible, delicious and healthy
Another civilised thing about yacon is that every part is edible as well as being good for you.  Some other vegetables have some parts you can eat and others you can not, or some things which must be eaten cooked as they are toxic if raw, or irritating hairs or spines that must be dealt with, all parts of yacon can be eaten either raw or cooked.  The large sweet crunchy tubers are the part that we like the best, we do not tend to eat any other parts.  Mostly we eat the tubers raw, some people just dig them up and eat them as is but I peel them as the skin can taste a little like resin.  I find that if I slice them thin they taste the best.

Yacon is crunchy and sweet, after cooking it retains its crunch but tends to take on the flavour of whatever it is cooked with.  It can be used in the place of water chestnuts in recipes.  Even though yacon is very sweet the sugars are not digested by people which makes it fine to be eaten by diabetics.  Yacon is high in inulin (which is different to insulin), inulin is a natural prebiotic which feeds the good bacteria in your body and helps to exclude the bad bacteria.  This means that as well as tasting great yacon is good for you.

Once harvested yacon tubers seem to last anywhere from a few months to a year depending on climate in which they are stored.  One year we had far too many yacon tubers so decided to freeze some of them.  Once frozen they last seemingly forever.  To eat them it is important not to thaw them as they go black and slimy looking.  I remove the tubers from the freezer, peel them with a vegetable peeler, slice them and eat them.  When frozen yacon tubers are easy to peel and easy to slice.  When frozen yacon tastes different to when it is raw, it is difficult to describe but it kind of tastes like frozen banana custard.  My kids seem to like frozen yacon even more than they like raw yacon.

Another remarkably civilised thing about yacon is that the part that you eat is different to the part that you plant to grow a crop for next season.  Unlike other vegetable crops where you have to decide how much to eat and how much to save to replant or you have to decide how many plants to let go to seed, you eat all of the yacon tubers and plant all of the propagative rhizomes.  As yacon is propagated by division and does not produce seed you do not have to worry about caging or separating to keep seed pure or growing enough plants to avoid inbreeding depression.  Growing yacon by divisions means you never have to worry about the neighbours growing GM crops that will cross pollinate and ruin your plants, the yacon that we grow and eat today is genetically the same as the yacon plants that the Incas domesticated and grew.

Small yacon plant almost ready to be harvested after frost

Harvesting Yacon

The different parts of yacon are easy to tell apart as the tubers are large and brown and look like sweet potato, the propogative rhizome is purplish and small and has growing points, you will see these when you harvest yacon.

I look forward to yacon harvest each year, not only because it means that in a few weeks I will be eating sweet yacon, but also because of the unmistakable yacon smell.  It is a smell that can't be described, a smell that says that winter is here, a smell that helps keep me connected to the land and the seasons, a smell I miss over the rest of the year.  When we harvest yacon I carefully dig/pull up a plant and shake it gently.  The edible tubers fall off in a civilized pile and what is left in my hand is for dividing and replanting.

Yacon leaf,  it "feels like a soft blanket"

The leaves are large and fuzzy, as Igloo says they "feel like a soft blanket".  I have heard that in Peru the leaves are used to wrap food before it is cooked, kind of like a banana leaf or a grape leaf, but I am yet to try this myself.  A herbal 'tea' can be made from the leaves which helps to even out blood sugar.  The leaves can be picked and used straight away, or they can be left somewhere out of the sun to dry and then used to make the herbal tea later.  Unlike many herbal claims this claim that yacon leaves lower blood sugar levels seems to have been tested and proven to be true.  I have only made tea from the leaves once and found the taste to be a little odd, kind of like peppermint mixed with something.  I didn't really like it, but I didn't hate it, I am glad to say that the taste was not very strong.  It would probably taste nice if you mixed it with something that tastes better or something that has a strong taste that would overpower the yacon.


Where to buy yacon plants in Australia

As I already mentioned, if you have not eaten yacon you are missing out on something really special.  The chances are that you will never see yacon in the supermarket, so if you plan to try some or if you want your children to try some you must grow your own.  I do sell yacon rhizomes (a bit larger than the ones in the pictures above) here.


Ecclesiastes 3:1-2  There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens; a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,

Rainbow Jelly Cake

I took on the stupid idea of making Mr 4 a rainbow jelly cake for his birthday. With some sound advise from a friend I embarked on using agar agar as it sets much quicker. This sure was a help. The cake looks great besides some colouring issues. But it is nasty to eat. It sort of crumbles in your mouth, the texture makes me gag. Flavour is fine though.

I found very few recipes online for Jelly cakes using Agar Agar is was just a bit of luck of the draw if it would turn out. I think I will only use half the agar next time, will run some tests first to find out just how little agar agar can be used so the cake still stands up but is actually edible. The recipe I used is this

Blue top layer with lollies (I would do a clear top layer to show the lollies better next time)
250ml liquid (I used part blueberry juice from stewing some blueberries and part water)
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp agar agar

Milk Layer (I would colour this blue next time or whatever colour I wanted on top)
125ml water
125ml milk
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp agar agar

Red Layer
250ml liquid (about half a punnet stewed and mushed strawberries, rest water)
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp agar agar
(I also chopped the remainder of the punnet to put in this layer)

Orange Layer
250ml liquid
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp agar agar

Green Layer
250ml liquid (I used pineapple juice, really should have used this for an orange or yellow layer)
just under 1/4 sugar
1 tsp agar agar

I made each layer as I went
1. place each layers ingredients in a saucepan, brought to the boil for a few seconds to make sure all had boiled. Pulled off heat and added the colour till desired colour.
2. pour into mould
3. Start boiling next layer.
4. pour into mould once the previous layer was JUST set, I have read if you let it set too much the layers wont stick together and slide apart, you can gently scrap the previous layer with a fork if this happens. Each layer took longer then the last to set. The first set before I had the second layer ready. I had to wait and reheat the green layer as the orange wasn't ready.

Keep going till you have all layers done. Then I set in the fridge over night.

Good luck with your making :)

Perennial Vegetables For Sale in Australia

Even though this blog post was written a decade ago I update it often.  It is the year 2024, and I am still selling seeds and plants.  If you are viewing this on your mobile phone you may need to scroll down below the comments and click on 'view web version'. 

To order send me an email, my email address will need the spaces removed, @ instead of the 'at' and . in place of the word 'dot': damien_beaumont at yahoo dot com dot au

This is my For Sale page, with heirloom vegetable seeds, berry plants, and perennial vegetable plants for sale in Australia, this page is updated regularly.  For notes on how to grow perennial vegetables please visit here.  Many of the plants or seeds below also have a hyperlink to a blog page on growing them.  If you would like growing notes on anything that is not listed on the growing notes page please let me know and I can email them through to you.  I can't tell you the 'right' way to grow them, or even the 'best' way to grow them, I can only tell you what works well for me.  

For a list of vegetable days to harvest from planting seed please click here.  
 

 

To order: please send me an email saying what plants/seeds you would like and I will reply with prices/payment methods.

My email address will need to remove the the spaces, put @ instead of the word 'at' and . in place of the word 'dot': damien_beaumont at yahoo dot com dot au



Organic Perennial Vegetables for sale – plant once, harvest forever!
 
POSTAGE: for plants/bulbs I post at cost $10.90 for regular post.  I post plants bare rooted on the Monday after payment has cleared.
 

Babington's Leek (Allium ampeloprasum var. babingtonii)  This is an extremely rare and fun perennial vegetable to grow.  Similar to a tree onion it grows many bulbils on the flower stalk instead of producing seed.  It is used in the same way and has the same taste as a regular leek.  This will prove to be a talking point in any garden and a great heirloom to pass on to your kids.  Extremely hardy and productive but for some reason it is so rare that it is almost extinct.  Please read my Babington's leek growing notes prior to ordering   $5 per dormant bulbil or very small plant depending on the season 

Perennial Leek (Allium ampeloprasum) rare and hard to find but one of the best plants for home growers.  These grow and taste like regular leek but instead of growing viable seed they reproduce by sending up numerous babies from their base.  Much faster and easier than growing from seed.  If hot and dry over summer they can die down to bulbs.  These are hardy once established and incredibly productive  $4 per small plant

Everlasting Onion (Allium cepa perutile) grows like a spring onion but does not often produce viable seed, reproduces quickly by splitting in half.  Will also grow a small bulb similar to a French shallot in some climates.  This is possibly the hardiest, most productive, and easiest to grow of perennial vegetables.  One of the best permaculture vegetables.  Very easy to grow, you will never have to buy spring onions or shallots ever again!  $5 each 

 

Tree onion, aka topsetting onions, aka Egyptian walking onion (Allium × proliferum, formerly Allium cepa var proliferum).  It is a stable hybrid dating back to the 1850s that is worth having around.  Bizarre looking plant grows a golf ball sized onion that divides underground then grows tiny onions instead of seed on the flower stalk.  Sometimes a flower stalk will have a tiny onion with its own flower stalk with tiny onions on that and you end up with three or four levels on the one plant.  These flower stalks bend under the weight of all the onions allowing the plant to “walk”.  These were very common once and are now rare and hard to find  $3 per small plant or bulbil

  

Amiah potato, the great taste of a diploid potato without the low yields that are common among diploids. The size of potatoes is reasonable, they don’t need peeling, and easily produces two crops per year.  It is healthier and better looking than white potatoes due to its rich yellow flesh and interesting skin colour. They produce two crops per year here, and always survives over winter in the soil with no care from me.  As well as all this they produce huge numbers of beautiful purple flowers.  Plant them now as they don't store well out of the soil   $6 for three small seed potatoes  SOLD OUT FOR NOW Should have more Jan/Feb

Jerusalem Artichoke (Helianthus tuberosus) a massively productive low maintenance perennial vegetable that is high in inulin.  Can be eaten raw or cooked and is used in any way that you would use a potato.  Very productive, one small tuber fragment can produce well over 1kg!  When grown in good soil and watered occasionally each plant can produce well over 3kg of tubers.  Great food for people, pigs, poultry, sheep, cattle, guinea pigs etc.  Masses of yellow sunflower like flowers in autumn attract honey bees and are good to use as cut flowers.   ONLY available in Winter/Spring,  $3 each  tuber 

Duckweed (Lemna sp most likely Lemna minor) is a free floating plant and one of the smallest flowering plants in the world.  I have grown this continuously and moved it with me for the past 20 or so years and have never actually seen the flowers.  It grows very fast and can be used to clean water, as animal food, in aquariums, and can be eaten raw by people if you are certain there are no water snails.  It has a mild taste, good levels of many important nutrients and is surprisingly high in protein  $3 for a scoop
 

 Azolla (I'm not certain of the species, likely Azolla pinnata) also known as mosquito fern, fairy moss, and a few other cute names.  Azolla is a free floating water fern.  It sequesters nitrogen from the atmosphere and can be used as living mulch, biofertiliser, animal feed, human food, water cleanser, mosquito control etc.  This has high percentage of protein and is readily eaten by poultry and fish.  It grows fast and doubles every day under ideal conditions   $3 for a scoop

Spider plant (Chlorophytum comosum) is commonly grown as an ornamental houseplant, but the leaves and roots are both edible.  Tolerates low light, poor soil, and dry conditions.  Grows white flowers and cute little baby plants on long stolons that can dangle from the mother plant and look very attractive.  Perfect for hanging baskets and a great office plant.  Spider plant survives a lot of neglect and should be protected from heavy frost.  Choose from variegated (white in middle of the leaves, green outside), reverse variegated (green in middle, white outside), or completely green.  Small plants  $3 each

Pink dandelion (Taraxacum pseudoroseum) is a different species than regular lawn dandelions.  All parts are edible by people, poultry, and livestock.  Leaves are more nutritious than most vegetables, roots can be made into a caffein free coffee substitute, and the flowers are pink with a yellow center.  The pink gets darker each day the flower is open.  These perennial plants are more fragile than common dandelions so tend not to escape into your yard.  $5 per bare rooted plant

Asparagus 'Precoce D'Argenteuil' (also called 'Early Argenteuil'), the history of this fast growing gourmet heirloom variety is rather obscure and vague, some sources state it was developed in the 1700’s, others claim it was developed as late as 1885.  Produces fat flavoursome spears that are green tipped with pink to purple.  This is likely to be the best tasting green variety you will ever eat, I have heard it described as ‘delicacy incarnate’.  One year old plants $5

Duck Potato (Saggitaria sp) also known as arrowhead, wapato, swan potato and a host of other names.  It is an attractive edible aquatic perennial vegetable similar to Chinese water chestnuts but better suited to cooler climates.  Large green arrow shaped leaves.  Highly productive and simple to grow.  This particular one does not flower which means that is poses no weed threat   $3 per small plant

Skirret (Sium sisarum) very rare, endangered, and ancient perennial root vegetable which is very simple to grow.  Sweet roots taste like a delicious sweet potato or parsnip but far better.  Used in any dish that calls for potato, carrot or parsnip.  The celery tasting leaves can be added to salads and the seeds are edible but it is the sweet roots that are the main crop here.  This is the most delicious roasted vegetable ever.  Flowers attract many beneficial insects to your garden   $5 per small plant or offset

Affiliate program - follow the link, buy some of these

Fruit shaping moulds - grow square lemons, heart shaped apples, scary face pumpkins, square watermelons and more.  It is so much simpler than you think, plus you do it at home with your organic produce.  To order plastic fruit shaping molds use this link and note this is an external site, and I do earn a commission from each sale. 

Organic Heirloom Vegetable Seeds - most are not perennial but it is certainly worth growing these.

Postage of seeds only within Australia: $3.50  for any number of packets.  If also buying plants use the plant postage rate as I will send everything in the one package.  I can also post some seeds overseas but I post at cost so need to confirm postage costs with the post office. 
 

Immali Corn (Zea mays) a beautiful and delicious coloured sweet corn.  I have created this amazing variety myself, the colours are not changed during cooking (we ate the cob in the photo).  Produces 2 to 6 cobs of coloured sweet corn per plant.  This is high in anthocyanin, antioxidants and vitamins.  Why grow yellow corn when this is prettier, tastier, and healthier for you!  Corn will cross pollinate with other varieties of corn so you may have some yellow seeds if someone is growing yellow corn near by   $4.00 per packet of about 20 seeds

Giant Heirloom Tomatoes (Lycopersicon esculentum) a mix of seeds containing both "Julia Child" and "Giant Siberian Pink" (known in Russian as: Sibirskiy Velikan Rozovyi).  They are both delicious and large tomatoes.  'Julia Child' grows regular leaf and 'Giant Siberian Pink' grows potato leaf so you can tell from a young age which seedlings are which.  These are open pollinated varieties that are both indeterminate.  $4.00 per packet of about 20 seeds

Angora 82 tomato small plant which grows to about 1 foot tall, may or may not be dwarf, very productive with about 20 flowers per truss.  Small, red, round tomatoes which taste really nice and sweet.  This plant gave a large yield very early, has regular leaf and appeared to be determinate but kept putting out occasional new branches with flowers until the frosts.  $4 per packet of about 20 seeds

Igloo tomato, stocky plants, around 1 foot tall.  Highly productive, producing about 12 kg of remarkably consistent red round fruit that weighs just under 50g each.  Each truss usually contains about 16 flowers.  Very early cropping, great for producing a lot of food under short seasons and small spaces.   $4 per packet of about 20 seeds

Little Oak Like tomato small determinate tomato that produces red ping pong ball size tomatoes.  Like many other old Russian varieties it has a very rich tomato taste.  Looks much like 'Igloo' but slightly less stocky, a bit tastier, and less productive.  Very early cropper great for areas with a short growing season.   $4 for a packet of about 20 seeds

Micro Tom tomato the smallest variety of tomato in the world!  I have never had one grow over 10cm tall.  Being so small they can easily be grown in a cup of soil, easy for kids to grow, easy for elderly people who no longer have a garden, easy to grow in apartments if you have a sunny window, and great for school experiments due to its short life cycle   $4 for 15 seeds


 

Yellow Pear Tomato (Lycopersicon lycopersicum) a sweet, yellow, pear shaped cherry tomato.  This is an old and loved heirloom variety dating back to the 1700’s.  It was the first yellow tomato I ever grew.  It can grow to be a large plant if given support and is very productive if treated well.  Beautiful, delicious, sweet and easy to grow, kids love the look and taste of the fruit.  Heirloom tomato can and will cross with other varieties of heirloom tomato so be a little careful if saving seed  $4.00 per packet of about 20 seeds

Skirret (Sium sisarum) very rare, endangered and ancient perennial root crop which is simple to grow.  Sweet roots taste like a delicious sweet potato or parsnip.  Used in any dish that calls for potato, carrot or parsnip.  Leaves can be added to salads but it is the sweet roots that are the main crop here.  Flowers attract many beneficial insects to your garden.  Unlike many other perennial vegetables, seed grown plants will produce a crop, divide numerously, flower, and set seed the first year   $4 per packet of tiny seeds

Superior Coriander (Coriandrum sativum) mixed seeds of around a dozen varieties including 'slow bolt', 'long standing', and 'Bengal Giant'.  This is an excellent producer of both leaves and seeds.  There has been deliberate crossing of varieties so you will have great genetic diversity and be able to breed a superior variety that performs well in your garden.  Cull plants that flower early and only save seed from later flowering plants to quickly and easily develop your own variety that is is slow to flower and produces abundant leaves   $4 per packet of seeds

Cape Gooseberries (Physalis peruviana) is also known as Incaberry, goldenberry, pichuberry, and a few other common names. Highly productive plants producing over one kilogram of small ~2g fruits that are covered with a protective paper husk. The fruits fall from the plant when ripe. For me they take a little over 80 days from planting the seed until eating perfectly ripe berries  $4 per packet of tiny seeds

Hillbilly tomato has firm flesh that is reasonably dry and somehow smells very fruity.   Produces a medium yield of glossy fruit over the season, it has regular leaf and is indeterminate.  Good size for slicing on a sandwich, the colour, glossiness, and fruity smell are all enjoyed by my kids.  $4 per packet of 20 seeds

Cherokee Purple grows large tomatoes, some round, some a little odd shaped.  People often say this tomato has a smoky taste or taste of good red wine.  A little salt adds more depth and complexity to their taste - Unbelievable!  This plant produces a medium to large yield of large fruit, it has regular leaf and is indeterminate.  $4 per packet of 20 seeds



Japanese Black Trifle (spelled various ways,  originally called "Yaponskiy Trufel Chernyi" or in Russian "Японский трюфель черный").  This old Russian variety has a deep, rich, sweet, tomato taste that is difficult to describe but easy to remember.  One of my all time favourite tomatoes.  Japanese Black Trifele tomato has potato leaf and is indeterminate.  $4 per packet of 20 seeds


Helsing Junction Blues are great high anthocyanin cherry tomatoes.  These taste sweet and are very productive.  The unripe fruit is bright purple, only goes blue/black where the sun hits and stays red when shaded by a leaf so you can make patterns using stencils similar to apples.  Ripe fruit is red with black where it used to be purple.  Plants have regular leaf and are indeterminate.  $4 per packet of 20 seeds

 

Tommy Toe tomatoes (I didn't take a photo) grow into a large plant with high yields of small tomatoes.  An excellent tomato for back yard growing due to their rich tomato taste, abundant yield, and pretty red round cherry tomatoes.  One of the more common varieties I grow as they are well worth growing.  Plants have regular leaf and are indeterminate.  $4 per packet of 20 seeds

Sarah's Galapagos tomatoes grow a large plant, high yields of small red cherry tomatoes.  They have a surprisingly deep rich taste for such tiny fruit.  It is said to be originally found on Galapagos Islands where they were eaten and dispersed by giant tortoises.  Plants have regular leaf and are indeterminate.  $4 per packet of 20 seeds

Giant Parsley (Petroselinum crispum) is an absolutely massive strain of flat leaf parsley that is very simple to grow.  Leaves can be used as vegetable or herb, petioles can be used in place of celery, roots are delicious roasted.  Contains wide genetics and will produce a diverse population containing some large plants and some stunningly massive plants.  If allowed to flower it will attract many beneficial insects and pollinators, and will gladly self seed.   $4 per packet of seeds

Giant Edible Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) produces incredibly large plants from improved parent stock.  Dandelion leaves are more nutritious than most vegetables, the thick long roots can be roasted or turned into delicious coffee substitute, even the pretty flowers are edible.  Poultry and livestock love to eat dandelions.  Deep tap roots mine minerals from deep in the soil, leaves can be used as compost activators.  They are great companion plants for most fruits and vegetables.  The flowers are pretty and are great for bees, and kids love to blow the seed heads.  Open pollinated plants may display some genetic diversity   $4 per packet of seeds 

Wasabi salad herb (Diplotaxis erucoides) is a leaf vegetable/herb that is far simpler to grow than true wasabi, tastes similar to wasabi, gives a similar nose tingling feeling as wasabi, and lacks the extreme heat of true wasabi.  Great in salads and on sandwiches.  It happily self seeds in my garden, sometimes pops up in my lawn, and is low/no maintenance.  It is can form a self sustaining patch that flowers all year and is excellent bee forage.   $4 per packet of tiny seeds

Purple Mustard - back in 2012 I bought some seeds for purple mustard.  My son loved purple mustard, and has saved seed and grown it every year since.  Leaves can be used as vegetable, or garnish, and seeds can be used to make condiment.  They produce large purple leaves with some green, profuse yellow flowers attract honey bees and other beneficial insects.  All profits from this go to my son for pocket money  $4 per packet  

Glass Gem Corn (Zea mays) - this is good popcorn, beautifully coloured and incredibly ornamental.  These cobs grow all the colours of the rainbow and are incredibly beautiful.  If popped as pop corn they still pop white (just like regular yellow popcorn).  The cobs average around 15 cm long, and I average 4.5 cobs per plant but could have had more if I gave them more space.  Do NOT grow near other types of corn, popcorn, sweet corn, as it will cross pollinate and ruin your cobs.   $4 for packet of about 20 mixed seeds

Pink Glass Gem Corn (Zea mays)  - I planted some glass gem corn in blocks of the same colour.  My daughters like the pink popcorn.  These are seeds from cobs that were mostly pink, they were growing in my pink block.  There was some cross pollination with other colours of glass gem corn, and some hidden genetics that are not expressed in these seeds, but the cobs produced should be mostly pink with only a few seeds here and there of other colours.  The cobs produced should look similar to the photo on the left.  All types of corn will cross pollinate a lot, do NOT grow other types of corn nearby or they will cross pollinate a lot.   $4 for a packet of about 20 pink or white seeds

Litchi tomato (Solanum sisymbriifolium) also known as Morelle de Balbis, Fire and Ice plant, or my kids call them "Prickle Tomatoes".  Litchi tomatoes are somewhat related to tomatoes, tomatillos, and ground cherries.  Like many of the fruiting vegetables we grow, they are a perennial that is treated as an annual.  Intriguing plants with delicious berries.  Difficult to describe the taste as they vary depending on how ripe they are when picked.  They can taste like cherry, kiwi fruit, or sometimes really bland.  I am told you need more than one plant for pollination and fruit set so I grow several seeds in one hole to save space   $4 per packet of about 20 seeds

Black Nebula Carrot (Daucus carota sativus) these heirloom carrots are the darkest of the dark.  They are so dark purple I would almost call them black. They really are incredible to see.  They are dark purple/black all the way to the core and will have a small amount of white flecked through.  I am told that these have undertones of berry taste, but I can't taste berries at all.  I found them to taste like a mix of carrot and beetroot, which I really like.  Even if you are not a fan of carrots these taste great.  These carrots retain their intense purple colour when cooked.   The juice can be used as a dye, and if you add some acidity it will turn bright pink.  Carrots will cross with other varieties of carrot and Queen Anne's Lace so take care if seed saving    $4 per packet of seeds

Huacatay (Tagetes minuta), is also called Peruvian Black Mint, is an annual herb.  It is not related to mint, but does taste and smell similar to mint, and can be used in similar recipes.  Used in sauce or herbal teas and an essential ingredient in many Peruvian dishes.  This herb is very simple to grow and very productive.  It grows tall over the warmer months, often about 5 or 6 feet tall (I had some reach over 9 feet tall) or shorter in poor soils.  Simple to save seed and grow the following year   $4 per packet of seeds

Pink dandelion (Taraxacum pseudoroseum) is a different species than regular lawn dandelions.  All parts are edible by people, poultry, and livestock.  Leaves are more nutritious than most vegetables, roots can be made into a caffein free coffee substitute, and the flowers are pink with a yellow center.  The flower opens white/light pink with a yellow center, pink gets darker each day the flower is open.  These perennial plants are more fragile than common dandelions so as much as I wish they would they tend not to escape into your lawn   $4 per packet of seeds

Organic Culinary Herb Plants

Unless started all herbs will have been grown from cuttings so that I can assure the quality of the plants, some herbs grow true to type from seed whereas others tend to be a little variable.  Most herbs (other than root cuttings, which are just a segment of root) are sold bare rooted, or with minimal soil on the roots to lower weight and reduce the postage cost.  Most will be wrapped in damp newspaper and put into a plastic zip lock bag.  Some may be dormant over winter and will not put on a lot of growth until Spring.  

I do not have large quantities of any herbs, if you want a larger quantity please ask me and I will let you know if I can help out.

Winter Savory (Satureja montana) is a highly aromatic perennial herb with peppery flavor with notes of marjoram, mint, and thyme.  Winter savory looks similar to thyme but has larger leaves.  It does well in roasts and stews, used to make salami, and is an essential ingredient to make Bouquet garni.  This was a popular herb in Europe and used in similar ways as pepper back when pepper was an expensive spice.  It flowers well and is very attractive to bees and other pollinators.  I don't know why this is not grown more frequently in Australia as it is an excellent perennial edible herb.   $5 per small seed grown plant 

Native Water Mint aka native rivermint, native peppermint (Mentha australis) this perennial Australian native herb is very rare in the bush and is rarely found in shops or gardens.  Flowers are great for native bees and other native pollinators.  It likes being well watered but can cope with reasonably dry soil.  It is used in much the same way as regular peppermint but is far less invasive and the small flowers are great for native pollinators.  It makes an excellent herbal tea served hot or iced   $5 per small plant 

Variegated Water Celery aka water parsley, Java waterdropwort, Japanese parsley, Chinese celery etc (Oenanthe javanica - flamingo)  is a perennial vegetable that is under utilised and strangely uncommon.  Extremely prolific and simple to grow.  Can be grown in the vegetable garden or as an emergent water plant.  Smells and tastes a lot like celery, add at the end of cooking or much of the taste will disappear   $5 per small plant

Vietnamese Coriander aka Vietnamese mint, laksa herb, hot mint, Cambodian mint, praew leaf (Persicaria odorata) is an amazing perennial edible herb.  Simple to grow, extremely productive, delicious, and versatile, I can't believe how uncommonly this is grown in Australia.  The internet says Vietnamese coriander has a “lovely coriander taste with a clear citrus note; refreshing with a hot, biting, peppery after taste”.  I grow as an emergent water plant but also happily grows in vegetable garden.  It goes well with chicken and combines well with lime, chillies, garlic, ginger and lemon grass, what is not to love about this plant!   $5 per small plant  

Vietnamese Fish Mint (Houttuynia cordata) also known as dokudami, 'poison blocking plant',  lizard tail, heartleaf, fishwort, bishop's weed, and a bunch of other names.  Commonly used in Vietnamese cooking, herbal tea, as well as a host of different traditional medicines.  It tastes like fish sauce.  I am selling small plants of the vigorous green form.  This plant can become invasive if planted in the garden so please restrict it to growing in a pot.  Dormant over winter   $5 per small plant or well rooted cutting
 

Jekka's thyme (Thymus sp) is an extremely vigorous growing edible thyme with relatively long green leaves.  This has a strong thyme smell and taste.  It is the most vigorous thyme I have ever grown.  It flowers like crazy in spring and provides great bee forage.  Taking cuttings every few years will refresh it and provide you with more plants.   $5 per small plant

Common Spear Mint (Mentha spicata) this fragrant, strong smelling plant is one of the easiest and most rewarding herbs to grow.  Great plant to get children introduced to gardening and connected to the land.  Used to make mint sauce, garnish and in a host of different ways while cooking.  When I was a child it was grown in every garden, starting to become difficult to find for some reason.  Grown organically from cuttings as seeds can be variable and often give undesirable traits.  Grow in a pot to prevent it from taking over your garden   $5 per small plant 

Lavender mint (Mentha piperita 'Lavendula') this edible mint smells like lavender!  I use it in herbal tea and my kids love it, it also goes well in cold summer drinks, and I am told it goes well with chicken and other white meats where it imparts a floral aroma.  Lilac flowers attract bees and butterflies.  Large almost fluffy leaves not only smell great they also look and feel nice.  Lavender mint is my second favourite variety of mint, and it is the most vigorous in growth so please grow it in a pot to prevent it taking over your garden  $5 per small plant

Willow herb (Epilobium parviflorum).  Other common names include 'small flowered willow herb', 'hoary willowherb' and 'small flowered hairy willow herb'.  This is a perennial edible herb, the leaves can be added to a salad and eaten raw or cooked, or dried and used in herbal teas.  This herb has been used as medicine to treat prostate and kidney issues and to reduce tumor growth, there are a few studies indicating it could be effective in treating these ailments.  This plant loves water.   $5 per small plant 

Organic berry plants

Atilla Alpine Strawberry (Fragaria vesca) is a red fruited wild strawberry that is day length neutral.  It is an extremely rare alpine strawberry that produces runners and can form an edible ground cover.  The strawberries are much smaller than supermarket strawberries, but they taste meltingly delicious and they smell truly amazing.  If you have never eaten a wild strawberry you don't know what you are missing.  Alpine strawberries are also known as gourmet strawberries or fraise des bois   $5 per plant

 

Pineberry strawberry produces small white berries with red seeds.  They get a pinkish blush when ripe and taste a bit like pineapple.  These only produce female plants, so need another strawberry to pollinate them and they never grow true from seed.  It crops twice per year in my garden.  Throws a lot of runners  $5 per plant

Virginian strawberry (Fragaria virginiana) are a species of wild strawberries from North America.  They taste similar to garden strawberries you can buy from the markets but with far more intense and sweet flavour.  These have been selectively bred for larger sized berries as wild plants produce tiny berries.  Berries have deeply set seeds.  Grows lots of runners, flowers twice per year in my garden.  Very hardy plants   $5 per plant 

Carnivorous Plants
I know this page is mostly for perennial vegetables and other organically grown edibles, but please don't get confused and start to eat your carnivorous plants!    

Venus Flytrap (Dionaea muscipula) are the most famous and one of the most intriguing of carnivorous plants.  They grow best in areas with frosts but can be grown in frost free climates.  Never shut the traps with your finger, don't feed them, and don't fertilise them.  Growing notes can be found here.  $8 each small bare rooted plant 

Cape Sundew (Drosera capensis) is one of the easiest of all carnivorous plants to grow.  They were the first carnivorous plants I ever grew successfully as a child and from them I learned how to grow other carnivorous plants.  These catch numerous flies, moths, mosquitoes, and other insects.  Don't feed them unless you know what you are doing or you may kill the plant.  Grow them in damp peat moss (never soil) in a tray of water, never fertilise, and protect from heavy frosts.  They tend to lose their 'dew' and sulk after being posted, but it doesn't take them long to pick up again.  You choose between 'typical' and 'alba' varieties.   $6 per small plant

Cape Sundew (Drosera capensis) SEEDS.  These carnivorous plants are surprisingly simple to grow from seed but very few places ever list seed for sale.  Simply place damp peatmoss in a small pot, keep a tray of water under at all times, and sprinkle the fine dust like seeds on top.  Most will germinate in a few weeks.  I have 'typical' has red tentacles and pink flowers, 'alba' has green or light pink tentacles and white flowers.  Seeds are tiny as per the picture on the left. The seed packet is a mix of 'typical' and 'alba' seeds   $4 per packet containing hundreds of tiny freshly collected seeds





Ornamental - non-edible plants or seeds

String of Pearls plant (Senecio rowleyanus).  Very simple to grow and very beautiful.  They grow tiny white flowers in winter that smell like cinnamon.  Grow them somewhere that they can trail over the side of their pot.  When you receive the cutting please remove the lower few pearls (leaves), plant the stem in soil and water it well.  If you buy a plant it will need to be planted in a pot of soil.  These look delicate but are surprisingly hardy and grow reasonably fast.  These are ornamental only, please never eat any part of them   $5 per small bare rooted plant, $2 per cutting

Muscari seeds (Muscari armeniacum) also known as grape hyacinth, are a spring flowering bulb that produces sweetly fragrant blue flowers, sometimes blue and white, or even just white.  Simple to grow, naturalises well, loved by honey bees, and dies down over summer so is water wise. Simple to grow from seed but won't flower the first year.  Seeds are far cheaper than bulbs so you get far more plants for your money.  Each seed grown plant will be genetically unique but most look similar to their siblings   $4 for packet of 35 fresh seeds

Candle Making

I have seen these candles for sale for up to $13, with $9 each being about average, so buying a mould and making some of your own works out well.  If you enjoy it you can get more wax and make more candles, or experiment with fragrances and essential oils etc.

Candle making mould - skep

These produce really cute little beehive candles with bees on them.  I use around 40g to 50g of wax.  One silicone skep mould can be used to make hundreds of  candles, and I can provide simple instructions  $10 for the mould

Note: candle not included, you are buying a pink silicone mould to make your own candles

 

Candle making kit - owl
This mould is easy to use and produces little owl candles with an incredible amount of detail.  Candle making is a great project to do with kids on a rainy day.  The price is for one owl silicone mould can be used to make hundreds of candles,  and I can provide simple instructions $10 for the mould 
Note: candle not included, you are buying a pink silicone mould to make your own candles

 

 

1 Corinthians 3:6-7  I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow.  So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.