Are you herbally experienced?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Our toll free number eight hundred eight two three eight
two five five. Good morning. I am Ron Wilson, your
personal yard boy, talking about yarding it as I promised.
Guess who is here? Yes, it's time for Are you
herbally experienced? You're saying, what are you urbally experienced? What
are you talking about? Well? She is our ccp CMH
Award winning syndicated journalist, Appalachian herbal scholar, member of the

(00:23):
Herbal Society of America. She's a regular contributor to Sacred
Heart Radio and our iHeartRadio as well. She's a founding
editor of About eating dot com. She's a motivational speaker,
cooking teacher. I could go on and on and on,
ladies and gentlemen, how about a big round of applause
for Rita Nader Hikenfeve. Oh they're all here today because

(00:49):
they know it's cherry bounce day. Hey, hey, yay, Yeah,
you know it cherry bounce Day.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Well, that certainly will will draw them in, don't you think.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
Yeah, anytime you have cherry bounce out there, Rida's cherry bounce,
it will draw them in. So how you doing?

Speaker 2 (01:09):
We are doing well. The gardens, the herb garden, the
vegetable garden, you know, with all this rain, like you
had mentioned earlier, doing really well. We still have seems
like more dear families than ever. But other than that, yeah,
everything's growing pretty well. I know. But you know what,

(01:30):
we don't fence anything in, so I cannot complain. So
but Frank's corner is doing amazingly well, probably the earliest
crop we've had in years.

Speaker 1 (01:42):
In extremely straight rows.

Speaker 2 (01:46):
Now don't tell you. Did you come past here?

Speaker 1 (01:50):
I didn't say anything.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
Uh wait a minute, wait, wait you were going to
You said that you were going to drop off a
butterfly blue pea plant, and I think I would love
to have that, but I don't. I'm looking out.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
Now, it's not there. No, no, I was, Oh no, no,
I just know he likes he likes straight rose of corn.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
Well they're not a straight this year because I he
administrated and I and I plant.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
Oh so there's a little bit of a bow to him.
Then yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
They're a little wavy, but you know what, you get
more productions, so yeah, we're good.

Speaker 3 (02:27):
Good.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
I get good pollination that way. By the way, I
got a shout out to Tammy and Ray Hughes in
Kyahoga Falls. They said they sent me a picture of
their container shashiito peppers and they said that last year
you and Rita got us hooked on shashiitos and they

(02:48):
had one lon shashito plant last year and a container.
Now they have a whole bunch of them. They love
the shoshidos, so they're thanking you for getting them hooked
on shohetos.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Well, you know, that is such a trend, the pepper
and restaurants, and it's a funny one, easy to grow.
It's sort of I don't know. They remind me of halapenos,
but they're wrinkly looking and there's always a rogue one
in the batch. They're sort of spicy, but there's always,
As I said, if you pick ten, there's one that's
going to give you a little bit of heat. But restaurants,

(03:19):
and you have told me this because you've eaten them,
they blister them in a hot cast iron skillet with
a little olive oil and then they serve it with
like a oh Brenets or some sort of fun sauce. Yeah,
I'm glad. That's wonderful.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
They'll sea salt on top of there. Absolutely I just
eat the whole thing right from the bottom of stem.
I'll just pop in your mouth. One of the restaurants
would go to that. They do it. They do the
best job with it. Is they call it pepper roulette.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
Oh that's a fancy name.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
Well, because that way about it, Like you just said,
you know, every so often you might grab into a
hot one, so you're playing pepper roulette. So there you go.
All right, we're not here to talk about peppers. We're
here to talk about one of your most requested recipes,
and that would be cherry bounce. Why is that?

Speaker 2 (04:05):
Yeah? You know what with these heirloom old recipes, there's
always a story and how I can't even tell you
how many times I've told this before. One of my
childhood friends, and Rudloff's mother was one of those country
women who actually grew up in a suburban area much
like I did, but she carried all that country wisdom

(04:27):
with her and she would grow her own rose bushes
from like a little start and then she'd stick it
in the ground like a stem with a glass over it,
and it would root over the winter. But one of
the things she made every year she called it cherry bounce,
and in her family it was considered a medicinal. And

(04:48):
basically you have to wait for the season, which is
now for the dark sweet cherries. It's dark sweet cherries,
sugar and bourbon whiskey. So basically, you take about a
pound of cherries and you take the stems off. Some
people pit them, but I don't. Some people even prick

(05:09):
each cherry so that they infuse better. I don't do that.
I just put them in a big glass jar and
then I'll put some Now, Mary used what she would
call them little sugar sticks. It's crystallized sugar on a
string or on a stick, and you can buy those.
It's like rock candy. And she would put about twelve

(05:31):
ounces of those in her jar with the cherries. And
you can use about a couple cups of granulated sugar
or even honey in there too, And then she pour
in a whole bottle of bourbon whiskey, not just plain,
but bourbon. Bourbon has to be labeled bourbon if it's
made I believe here in the United States and oak

(05:51):
barrels and all that where I think whiskey can be
made anywhere, and bourbon has to have a certain amount
of corn like a green mixture in it. Anyway, long
story short, it wasn't an expensive bourbon, and you just
have to let that sit several months to and puse
and by the time Christmas comes and you taste it

(06:14):
as you go along, of course, and by the time
Christmas comes it turns into beautiful like a burgundy crystally red,
and it's sort of syrupy, and then you can sip
it either as a cordial or as Mary said, good
for anything that ails you. And you think, mister Wilson,

(06:35):
cherries have huge anti inflammatory qualities and if you use
honey gosh, you've got lots of good antibacterial qualities there
as well. And then the bourbon, I'm not sure the qualities,
but it makes everything go down, warms you to your toes,
and so if you have a cough or cold upper respiratory,

(06:57):
I'm not saying drink a whole mug of it. We
use do a couple of tablespoons, but now it's very
trendy to serve as a cocktail, not a soup spoon.

Speaker 1 (07:08):
Tablespoon.

Speaker 2 (07:10):
Well, see, that's funny that you said that, because growing
up mom had no measuring spoons. But tablespoon. Measure was
a tablespoon yep. So I bet I'm thinking you probably
grew that way, grew up that way too well.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
Yeah, absolutely, And I think the remind folks too. You
can use you can use a top shelf bourbon or
top shelf whiskey if you want to. I mean, that's
that's it. It makes even better as far as I'm concerned.
Or you also suggested you could use brandy or vodka.
If you prefer vodka, you can do that as well.
So you can do all of them, and believe it

(07:45):
or not, Rita even has on this recipe, which you
can find at ron Wilson online dot com. A non
alcoholic cherry bounce I do.

Speaker 2 (07:54):
And you know why because I've had a lot of requests.
Now as far as what the non alcoholic cherry bounce does,
You've got a couple cups of the dark sweet cherries
and you cook that those with a cup of sugar
and three cups of water, sort of smush them down
as it goes, and then you after it's done, you

(08:16):
strain it out and add a little vanilla and lemon juice.
It's a lovely cordial. Now it's not gonna make your
bounce around because it doesn't have any booze in it,
but it's nice and that's usually served chilled where the
cherry bounce. You could serve it room temperature, chill warm, whatever.

(08:36):
But I wanted to make that just because there are
folks out there who love the flavor and maybe in
you know, prefer not to have the alcohol. So either
of those I think would make lovely gifts from the kitchen.

Speaker 1 (08:48):
What do you think I think I would hang on
to all the bottles myself.

Speaker 2 (08:53):
Yeah, I've got a big batch making now, so if
you happen to stop buy, you can do some testing
for me.

Speaker 1 (09:00):
Well that sounds good as a matter of fact, Joe
Strekker said, and mentioned that he hasn't had a bottle
in a while. I know he would rather you bring
the lemon lemon cello.

Speaker 2 (09:09):
You know. You know I'm gonna make him some. What
I have to wait till lemons are on sale because
I use a really good lemons, the thick skin lemons.
So I will do that for Joe. Yeah, I miss
seeing you you guys. I don't know what happened after
the pandemic thing sort of everything, didn't.

Speaker 1 (09:25):
They went to the phone interviews all the time. So anyway,
all right, yeah, talking with Rita hiking Feld of course
her website about eating dot com and you'll find your
recipes also on our website at Ron Wilson online dot com.
Quick break, we come back. We're going to walk out
into her garden, find out what's going on out there,
including lebonese zucchini. Ever heard of it. We're gonna talk

(09:46):
about it after the break here in the garden with
Ron Wilson talking yardening, talking herbal experience with our good
friend Rita hiking Felder website about eating dot com it's
cherry Bounce weekend and you can see that recipe be
on our website at Ryan Wilson online dot com. But
now we're going to walk out into the garden. I
thought of you the other night, Carol, and I had

(10:07):
zucchini pasta.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
Oh I bet that was good.

Speaker 1 (10:12):
You know we put that on the spinner thing and
spin out the pasta out of those zucchini.

Speaker 2 (10:16):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, So that's right. Because you
have one of those, that's what do you have like
a lemon garlic sauce with it all?

Speaker 3 (10:23):
No?

Speaker 1 (10:24):
I just had the plain old spaghetti sauce. I was
doctored up with basil and oregano and a little bit
more garlic. But here's the toper I always put in there.
You know what I'm going to say, liver, I sawte livers.
Put that in it, the zucchini spaghetti and then the
sauce over the top.

Speaker 2 (10:44):
Okay, you got me there? Did you say? Tell me again?
What else you put on?

Speaker 1 (10:49):
Saw livers?

Speaker 2 (10:50):
That's what I thought you said, like chicken liver.

Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yeah, chicken liver spaghetti sauce, and you put that in.
It's great, But this time it was turkey livers.

Speaker 2 (10:59):
The huge I can't even imagine where you got those.
I'll have to try that. So did you you know where.

Speaker 1 (11:05):
I got that? Was from the Roses back at their
original recipe original restaurant on the west side of town
used to serve spaghetti spaghetti liver spaghetti sauce.

Speaker 2 (11:16):
So that was an Italian Oh my goodness, it's outstanding.

Speaker 1 (11:20):
I mean, I love it. But anyway, we did the
spaghetti where you spin it out caroc on the machine,
and then the saute dad a little bit, and then uh,
like I said, put the livers in there and a
saw some top and pretty dark goods. So what is
Lebanese zucchini that mister hiken Feld is harvesting.

Speaker 2 (11:37):
Well, that missus Hikenfeld is harvesting. All he does is
administrate anymore. Oh okay, but that's okay. Yeah, it's Sometimes
it's called vegetable marrow squash. Sometimes it's called gray's zucchini.
It's a real light greenish gray zucchini and it's thicker walled,

(11:57):
sort of shorter than regular zucchini. But the really nice
thing is, even if it gets really big, the skin
staysts tender and the seeds don't get huge, and you know,
it doesn't get so pulpy. But we grew up with
what we called gouza, and it's lebonese zucchini stuff with
rice and lamb and herbs and spices, onions and garlic

(12:20):
and tomatoes, really delicious. And it's the real name is
called kusa ko u s a, But when we were little,
you know how you mangle a language, we always called
it gousa with a G. So mister Wilson I just
made it back the other day.

Speaker 4 (12:36):
So basically it's zucchini squash, but it's lighter in color
and sometimes it's called Mexican gray squash, and you'll know
just because it looks very light and it's a.

Speaker 2 (12:49):
Wonderful producer and just great for stuffing. And then the
inside flesh, I'll say for zucchini breads, So we don't
it's funny, we don't use the inside flesh as part
of the stuffing like some recipes do. But it's just
something summary that we only make in the summer because
of the zucchini harvest. So and you could certainly make

(13:10):
it with regular zucchini too.

Speaker 1 (13:12):
I love it. I think I was going to say
I loved your zucchini bread recipe last week because you
put the pineapple in there.

Speaker 2 (13:17):
Yeah, that was different. You know, trying to find something
different for zucchini breads is sometimes a challenge. So this
year I did a blueberry and the pineapple, something a
little different, really delicious too.

Speaker 1 (13:28):
Talking with Rita Hikenfelder website is about eating dot Com.
We're out in her garden right now taking a look around.
I've noticed. I guess it's because everything's growing so crazy
that lavender has a great year this year for lavenders
and flower dill flowering, basil flowering quickly, hard to keep
up with For folks that have lavender, both in the

(13:49):
landscape or in the herb garden, you know, you want
to harvest all of those flowers, and if you don't,
you want to get rid of all those like as
soon as they're.

Speaker 2 (13:57):
Spent, right oh yeah, yeah, That way the energy doesn't
continue to go into the flower in their seed, and
you know, compromises the plant. But lavender loves it hot
and dry. And the lavender of my herb garden along
the front part where the stones are is doing really
really well and just huge. And I grow the provence

(14:21):
and the hit coat and the growth o and they
all do really really well. And in the back of
the herb garden, which has sloped, this is odd because
it's on the hillier part. I don't know. The moisture
seems to have been trapped there. Don't ask me why,
because it's on you know, at the top of the
hill and it's struggling a bit. But any of your herbs,

(14:42):
whether they're lavender or basil dill, you want to start
harvesting those flower heads off now so that you have
them fresh. Except let me back up a bit with dill.
If you want the seed you've got to let that
get nice and brown. It's in flower now, beautiful pale green,
and then they'll develop the seeds. And when the seeds

(15:04):
start to turn like tannish brown, and if you shake
the plant just to tad, some will fall off. That's
when you harvest the dill seeds. You could also save
those to grow next year too, so and I do
that with my zucchini squash too, because of the Lebanese squashed.
The seeds are not hard to find, but they're quite expensive.

(15:25):
So think of that when you're harvesting your herbs and
you have some basil seeds, save those for next year,
and then you're ready to go.

Speaker 1 (15:33):
Thanks. We got about a minute ago. I noticed that
you are starting to harvest some potatoes in your containers.
What kind did you use?

Speaker 2 (15:40):
Uh? You know, I had Yukon gold that were organic
and sprouted. And I know that sometimes you always said
when you buy them from the groceries, they do something
to them and they may not sprout. But they sprouted
great and they're like this size. We had them the
other day, really tender, and yes, I put them in
a big container. You'll be proud of me.

Speaker 1 (16:00):
I'm always proud of you. But it is fun. It's
a great way to do it. And you know, if
you don't have a lot of space, you don't have
the right soil. Growing potatoes and containers are pretty darn easy,
actually it is.

Speaker 2 (16:11):
And then you don't have to worry about spading the mountain,
you know, breaking into them. So yeah, and the kids
love to do that too. They just upend the whole
container and they go to town looking for their little buried treasures.

Speaker 1 (16:22):
The last, but not least, you got a late planting
of cucumbers in so you have a late crop of
those as well.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
Oh and I'll be sharing some really good cucumber pickle
recipes like cloths and again, as.

Speaker 1 (16:33):
I always do, Rida Nator Hikenfelder website about eating dot com.
Always a pleasure. Tell mister Hikenfeld we said, low, I will.

Speaker 2 (16:41):
He's still lying in state, but when he wakes up,
I will do that. You have a wonderful week.

Speaker 1 (16:45):
You'll have that hearty breakfast already for him. All right,
thank you. Coming up next to Gary Bachmann from the
Southern Gardener Here in the Garden with Ron Wilson, Mister
Gary Bombastik Bachman headgrower for Harry's Carden no O Far.
His website is Gary dash grows dot com. Be sure
and check it out. Always have fun with Gary. And uh,

(17:06):
you know, are you doing you still do the micro
greens indoors?

Speaker 2 (17:10):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (17:10):
Absolutely, I don't do.

Speaker 5 (17:12):
I don't do them to the extent that I did
and when when we were at the market and selling
to the restaurants and things. But but I've I've always
got four trays going, bags of them in the in
the refrigerator and oh yeah, it's it's a fun, easy
way to get some you know, to get some easy,
easy growing greens.

Speaker 3 (17:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:34):
So if you have four trays, do you have your
favorites or do you grow basically the same thing all
the time? I love I love the cilantro ones. I
think they're cilantro ones which are kind of interesting, little
at little cilantro bite. But radishes I think are great.

Speaker 5 (17:48):
Yeah, radishes are good. I tend to like the kale
and the and the broccoli.

Speaker 3 (17:54):
There.

Speaker 5 (17:54):
There's a Johnny's has a kale mix called Kalelette and
and it so it's a mix of three or four
different kales that are all different colors and leaf shapes.

Speaker 3 (18:05):
I also like red CHOI.

Speaker 5 (18:09):
That that's basically I don't like, you know, some of
the the the random mixes that they have. And I
do some of the I do some of the herbs sometimes,
but but the herb microgreens stare a little finicky, and
I sometimes I just don't have the patience to to
grow those.

Speaker 1 (18:27):
What mister lover lover doesn't have the patience for some
of the microgreens.

Speaker 3 (18:32):
Yeah, listen, I want I want to make things easy. Yeah.
And you know a guy that likes things easy.

Speaker 1 (18:39):
His name's Gary too. Oh, I know it is that
it could talk with Gary Bachman again. His website is
garydashgrows dot com. And if you're ever interested in growing microgreens,
indoors twofold one. I have a couple of tip sheets
that he wrote a few years ago that they're apps outstanding,

(19:01):
probably two of the best, and I keep the links
to those on hand all the time. More happy to
send that to you. But it's a great way to learn.
And he mentioned Johnny Seeds. Johnny Seeds probably has three
pages of microgreen seeds that you can order. I'm unbelievable
some of the plants on there. I had no idea
to grow as a micro green and eat them, eat

(19:21):
them fresh like that. But it's crazy. But if you
want to try it, and it's like Gary said, it's
really actually pretty easy to do, and you can get
into it at all levels, and you can do it
year round. Doesn't take a whole lot, But let me
know and I'll leave elose back to you. But they
are truly two of the best the tip sheets I've
ever seen when it comes to growing microgreens, and Gary

(19:42):
Bachman had everything to do with that. So we'll send
them to you and get check it out. So as
we look outside right now looking at your lawn, I'm
assuming these warm seasoned grasses are loving it or do
they hate the ups and downs too?

Speaker 5 (19:57):
They are loving the temperatures. There are times when they
don't like all the rain. When we've been getting like
two or three days where we get like an inch
and a half a day and and everything just gets soggy.

Speaker 3 (20:11):
And what that does that that creates.

Speaker 5 (20:13):
Conditions for dollar weed to pop up, because that's what
dollar Weed's really an aquatic plant. But but when you
see it in your lawn, that means, man, it is
just too wet out there.

Speaker 1 (20:24):
That's a tough way to get rid of it.

Speaker 3 (20:25):
And it tends, it tends.

Speaker 5 (20:28):
It is very hard to get rid of it, really is.
Sometimes I kind of look at it. I used to
fight it, but I'm thinking, man, it's green, you know,
and if if people are just driving by, you know,
but god, look Gary's lawn looking pretty green out there,
you know, as long as you don't look too close.
Sometimes that.

Speaker 1 (20:48):
Was my old predecessor used to say, it's green from
the street.

Speaker 5 (20:52):
You're okay, listen, and my batcher's is in turf management.

Speaker 1 (20:58):
Okay, oh is it?

Speaker 5 (20:59):
But I'm kind of I'm kind of thinking, I'm kind
of okay with Hey, it looks green.

Speaker 3 (21:03):
I'm good. We'll just go with that.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
Oh I love it, all right. So let's go past
your yard then in the lawn, and let's look at
the hell strip out between the sidewalk and the street.
Because Gary Bachman every year does something different with the
hell strip out there, and it's very unique. As a
matter of fact, one year he was growing wheats and
grains and things like that. What do you got out here?
This year?

Speaker 5 (21:27):
This year, I'm growing a small mix of zinnia that
i've I've been collecting the seeds over the years, and
it's gonna be an item for my seed store.

Speaker 3 (21:38):
But it's a mix of small flowered.

Speaker 5 (21:41):
Zinia that only get eighteen to twenty four inches high.

Speaker 3 (21:44):
Nice, and so I've been saved keeping those kind of isolated,
saving the seeds, growing those back out again.

Speaker 5 (21:51):
And yeah, it's actually turned out turned out pretty good.

Speaker 3 (21:54):
You know.

Speaker 5 (21:54):
It's like I said, they're only about twenty four inches tall,
you know, the small all one inch one and a
half inch flowers, and it just it just gives a
real different look than some of those big, you know,
three four inch in the elegance that that we that
we that are great for cutting.

Speaker 3 (22:13):
It's just just just a nice option.

Speaker 1 (22:16):
I'll bet the pollinators are loving that as well.

Speaker 3 (22:19):
Man butterflies are all over it.

Speaker 5 (22:22):
Lots of swallow tails, the giant swallow tail, which is
the caterpillars forage on the citrus trees. Haven't seen I
haven't seen any monarchs, which really kind of disappoints me
because I'm an oe monitoring site here on the coast.
Oe is that is that that monarch parasite and and

(22:45):
so we we we catch the monarchs and we grab
them and put some tape on their abdomen and so
you can pull some scales off you and you can
see the the the parasite, the spoor as if they're
if they're on there. I just did a a video
that I've got a post of taking a monarch that

(23:06):
I got a caterpillar raised it and sampling it.

Speaker 3 (23:10):
So I've got to I've got to post that. But
it's it's you know, it's just something fun to do
in my retirement years, you know.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
So so when you if you do detect the parasite,
I mean, what what are you doing with I mean
what what? What information is being shared? Or what are
we trying to do?

Speaker 3 (23:26):
Uh?

Speaker 5 (23:27):
What what I do is I I I collect the
data and we send it into a entomologist.

Speaker 3 (23:34):
At University of Georgia who is who is.

Speaker 5 (23:36):
Then monitoring and mapping out across the gulf where we're
where we're picking up Oe.

Speaker 3 (23:42):
Got it?

Speaker 1 (23:43):
And can I be treated?

Speaker 3 (23:47):
Uh no, not not really. It's it's it's.

Speaker 1 (23:53):
Yeah, yeah, I get it, but you're but you're monitoring
and so yeah, keep it in touch. Gary Backman, always
a pleasure hearing from you. Keep reporting from this. We
love hearing from all the things that you're doing there.
I know Ron Roethlis has got to be jealous as heck,
with all the different seasons up and down throughout the
entire year, maybe he'll come down to hang out with
you as well. But always a pleasure again, Gary dash

(24:13):
grows dot com, have a great summer. We'll talk to
you as we get closer to the fall. Great n
Thanks man, Gary Bachman, our Southern gardner,