Yerba buena is a rambling aromatic herb of western North America, ranging from maritime Alaska southwards to Baja California. The plant takes the form of a sprawling, mat-forming perennial, and is especially abundant close to the coast.

The plant’s most common name, the same in English and Spanish, is an alternate form of the Spanish hierba buena (meaning “good herb”). The name was bestowed by pioneer Catholic priests of Alta California as they settled an area where the plant is native. It was so abundant there that its name was also applied to the settler’s town adjacent to Mission San Francisco de Asís.

In 1846, the town of Yerba Buena was seized by the United States during the Mexican-American War, and its name was changed in 1847 to San Francisco, after a nearby mission. Three years later, the name was applied to a nearby rocky island. Today millions of commuters drive through the tunnel on Yerba Buena Island that connects the spans of the San Francisco Oakland Bay Bridge.

In general, in most Spanish speaking countries, the term “yerba buena” refers to the particular local species of mint, which varies from region to region. The term has been used to cover a number of aromatic true mints and mint relative. All plants so named have medicinal properties, and some have culinary value as teas or seasonings, as well. Perhaps the most common variation of the plant is spearmint.

In parts of Central America yerba buena often refers to Mentha citrata, a true mint sometimes called “bergamot mint” with a strong citrus-like aroma that is used medicinally and as a cooking herb and tea. In Cuba, yerba buena generally refers to a popular plant also known as large apple mint, foxtail mint, hairy mint, woolly mint or, simply, Cuban mint.

In Puerto Rico a close relative of traditional culinary savory, Satureja viminea, is sometimes used. In Peru the name is sometimes applied to a shrubby aromatic marigold known as huacatay or “black mint”. In this case, despite some similarities of flavor, the herb in question is in the Sunflower family and is quite unrelated to any of the mints or mint-relatives with which it shares a name.

Douglas Firs are medium-size to large or very large evergreen trees, 60-350 feet tall. The name honours David Douglas, the Scottish botanist who first introduced them into cultivation in 1826. The needles are flat and linear, generally resembling those of most firs. The cones are distinctive in having a long three-pointed bract that protrudes prominently above each scale.

A California Native American myth explains that each of the three-ended bracts are a tail and two tiny legs of the mice who hid inside the scales of the tree’s cones during forest fires, and the tree was kind enough to be the enduring sanctuary for them.

The best-known species are the Green Douglas Fir on the Pacific coast, and the Interior Douglas Fir in the interior west of the continent extending from the southern Rocky Mountains to Alberta, Canada. Other less widely used names include Douglas Tree, and Oregon Pine. It is the state tree of Oregon.

The height of the tallest Douglas Fir ever documented was the Mineral Tree in Mineral, Washington, at 394 feet, measured several times between 1911 and 1925 by Richard McCardle, a University of Washington forester. The tallest living individual is the Brummitt (Doerner) Fir in Coos County, Oregon, at 326 feet tall. Only the Coast Redwood reaches greater heights based on current knowledge of living trees.

The wood is used for structural applications that are required to withstand high loads. Douglas Fir is used extensively in the construction industry. Other examples include its use for homebuilt aircraft. Very often, these aircraft were designed to utilize Sitka spruce, which is becoming increasingly difficult to source in aviation quality grades.

Douglas Fir is the most commonly marketed Christmas tree species in the United States, where they are sold along with firs like Noble Fir and Grand Fir. Douglas Fir Christmas trees are usually trimmed to a near perfect cone instead of left to grow naturally like Noble and Grand firs.

Pelargonium is a genus of flowering plants which includes about 200 species of perennials, succulents, and shrubs, commonly known as scented geraniums. They have a long history of use, although more for decorative purposes than for culinary use. From their native South Africa they were brought to England in the early 1600′s by John Tradescent, botanist for Charles the First of England. The plant he brought back was Pelargonium triste, one of the few scented geraniums with fragrant blossoms.

Scented geraniums were soon cultivated in the warm coastal regions of France and Spain, as well as Algeria and the coast of what was the Belgian Congo. The colonists brought scented geraniums with them to the new world. Even Thomas Jefferson grew them in his gardens at the White House.

Growing scented geraniums became a popular pastime of the people in Victorian England, where they would raise them in heated greenhouses. This trend continued until 1914 when fuel to heat the green houses was banned due to the war.

Today scented geraniums continue to be used in the making of perfumes. Synthetic rose oil is made using rose scented geraniums. The dried leaves are also used in sachets and potpourri. In aromatherapy rose scented geranium is used for facial steams as it is reputed to have anti-aging effects on the skin. It is also reputed to ease insomnia and have an antidepressant effect.

An aromatic, rose-scented herb, the whole plant has relaxant, anti-depressant and antiseptic effects, reduces inflammation and controls bleeding. All parts of the plant are astringent. It is used internally for nausea, tonsillitis and poor circulation. Externally, it is used to treat acne, haemorrhoids, eczema, bruises, ringworm and lice. The leaves can be used fresh at any time of the year. 

There is a great diversity among the varieties themselves, in the shape of their leaves, the color of their blossoms, blooming time, and intensity of their fragrances. One of the rose scented geraniums has a large, lacy snowflake leaf pattern. Another favorite is lime scented geranium. It has very tiny leaves, shaped like curly maple. Their fragrance is sharp and undeniably citrus. An added benefit of the citrus scented geraniums is that they contain citronella, a known mosquito repellent.

Scented geraniums have been developed in an enormous number of varieties including Coconut, Apple Cider, Lemon Meringue, Apricot, Strawberry and Chocolate Mint.

Basil is a culinary herb prominently featured in Italian cuisine, and also plays a major role in the Southeast Asian cuisines of Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. The plant tastes somewhat like anise, with a strong, pungent, sweet smell. It is originally native to Iran, India and other tropical regions of Asia, having been cultivated there for more than 5,000 years.

There are many varieties of basil. That which is used in Italian food is typically called sweet basil, as opposed to Thai basil, lemon basil and holy basil, which are used in Asia. While most common varieties of basil are treated as annuals, some are perennial in warm, tropical climates, including African Blue and Holy Thai basil.

Basil is commonly used fresh in cooked recipes. It is generally added at the last moment, as cooking quickly destroys the flavour. The fresh herb can be kept for a short time in plastic bags in the refrigerator, or for a longer period in the freezer, after being blanched quickly in boiling water. The dried herb also loses most of its flavour, and what little flavour remains tastes very different, with a weak coumarin flavour, like hay.

When soaked in water the seeds of several basil varieties become gelatinous, and are used in Asian drinks and desserts such as falooda or sherbet. Such seeds are known variously as subza, takmaria, falooda or selasih. They are used for their medicinal properties in Ayurveda, the traditional medicinal system of India.They are also used as popular drinks in Southeast Asia.

The various basils have such different scents because the herb has a number of different essential oils which come together in different proportions for various breeds. The strong clove scent of sweet basil is derived from eugenol, the same chemical as actual cloves. The citrus scent of lemon basil and lime basil is because they have a higher portion of citral which causes this effect in several plants. African blue basil has a strong camphor smell because it has camphor in higher proportions. Licorice Basil contains anethole, the same chemical that makes anise smell like licorice.

Basil contains large amounts of (E)-beta-caryophyllene (BCP), which might have a use in treating inflammatory bowel diseases and arthritis. BCP is the only product identified in nature that activates CB2 selectively. It interacts with one of two cannabinoid receptors, blocking chemical signals that lead to inflammation, without triggering cannabis’s mood-altering effects.

Recently, there has been much research into the health benefits conferred by the essential oils found in basil. Scientific studies have established that compounds in basil oil have potent antioxidant, anti-cancer, anti-viral, and anti-microbial properties. In addition, basil has been shown to decrease the occurrence of platelet aggregation and experimental thrombus in mice. It is traditionally used for supplementary treatment of stress, asthma and diabetes in India.

Gravenstein is a variety of apple native to Grasten in South Jutland, Denmark. The variety was discovered in 1669 as a chance seedling, although there is some evidence that the variety originated in Italy and traveled north. The skin is a delicately waxy yellow-green with crimson spots and reddish lines, but the apple may also occur in a classically red variation.

The Gravenstein was introduced to western North America in the early 19th century, perhaps by Russian fur traders, who are said to have planted a tree at Fort Ross in 1811. The Gravenstein apple was introduced to the Canadian province of Nova Scotia in the 19th century. Charles Rammage Prescott, the father of the Nova Scotian apple industry, grew Nova Scotia’s first Gravensteins in his orchard at Acacia Grove. By 1859, Gravenstein trees were commonly cultivated on Nova Scotian farms. The Gravenstein apple is still considered the choicest apple by many Nova Scotians.

The Gravenstein apple is considered by many to be one of the best all-around apples with a sweet, tart flavor and is especially good for baking and cooking. It is picked in July and August and is known as a good cooking apple, especially for apple sauce and apple cider. It does not keep well, so it is available only in season. In addition, their short stems and variable ripening times make harvesting and selling difficult.

The red Gravensteins, are considered a sport rather than a true variety. The flesh is juicy, finely grained, and light yellow. Trees are among the largest of standard root varieties, with a strong branching structure. The wood is brownish-red and the leaves are large, shiny, and dark green. It grows best in moderate, damp, loamy soil with minimal soil drying during the summer months. Locations close to watercourses and edges of ponds are preferred. Gravensteins will not thrive in areas of high groundwater and require moderate protection against wind.

During the first half of the 20th century, Gravensteins were the major variety of apples grown in western Sonoma County, and were the source for apple sauce and dried apples for the U.S. troops in World War II. Most of the orchards in Sonoma County are now gone due to a combination of suburban development, a shift to wine production, and economic changes in the apple industry. Only six commercial growers and one commercial processor remain in Sonoma County as of 2006. In 2005, Slow Food USA declared the Gravenstein apple a heritage food and included it in their Ark of taste. Slow Food USA reports that production in Sonoma County is currently 15,000 tons of Gravensteins a year.

Kombucha is the Western name for sweetened tea that has been fermented using a macroscopic solid mass of microorganisms called a kombucha colony.

The culture contains a symbiosis of acetic acid bacteria. The culture itself looks somewhat like a large pancake, and though often called a mushroom, a Mother of vinegar or by the acronym SCOBY (for Symbiotic Colony of Bacteria and Yeast), it is clinically known as a zoogleal mat.

The recorded history of this drink dates back to the Qin Dynasty in China around 250 BC. The Chinese called it the Immortal Health Elixir, because they believed Kombucha balanced the Spleen and Stomach and aided in digestion, allowing the body to focus on healing. Knowledge of kombucha eventually reached Russia and then Eastern Europe around the Early Modern Age, when tea first became affordable to the populace.

The name kombucha is said to have originated in Japan. Reportedly, a Korean physician called Kombu or Kambu treated the Emperor Inyko with the tea. It became known by a combination of the name, Kombu and the word, cha, meaning tea. However, in Japan, kombucha tea is known as kocha kinoko which translates as tea mushroom. Kombu literally means kelp in Japanese and the name Kombucha is used to refer to a hot drink made from powdered kelp.

Kombucha contains many different cultures along with several organic acids, active enzymes, amino acids, and polyphenols. For the home brewer, there is no way to know the amounts of the components unless a sample is sent to a laboratory. The US Food and Drug Administration has no findings on the effects of kombucha. Final kombucha may contain some of the following components depending on the source of the culture: Acetic acid, which provides much anti-microbial activity; butyric acid, gluconic acid, glucuronic acid, lactic acid, malic acid, oxalic acid, usnic acid, as well as some B-vitamins.

Health claims for kombucha focus on a chemical called glucuronic acid, a compound that is used by the liver for detoxification. The idea that glucuronic acid is present in kombucha is based on the observation that glucuronic acid conjugates are increased in the urine after consumption of kombucha.

However, the active component in kombucha is most likely glucaric acid. This compound helps in the elimination of glucuronic acid conjugates that are produced by the liver. When glucuronic acid conjugates are disposed in the bowel during the elimination process, normal gut bacteria can break up these conjugates using an enzyme called beta-glucuronidase. Glucaric acid is an inhibitor of this bacterial enzyme, so the end result is that the glucuronic acid waste is properly eliminated the first time, rather than being reabsorbed and detoxified over and over. Thus, glucaric acid probably makes the liver more efficient.

Interestingly, glucaric acid is commonly found in fruits and vegetables, and is being explored independently as a cancer preventive agent. It has also been discovered that the bacterial beta-glucuronidase enzyme can interfere with proper disposal of a chemotherapeutic agent, and that antibiotics against the gut microbiota can prevent toxicity of some chemotherapy drugs.

Other health claims may be due to the simple acidity of the drink, possibly influencing the production of stomach acids or modifying the communities of microorganisms in the GI tract. For example, anecdotal reports suggest better experience with foods that ‘stick’ going down such as rice or pasta. This is mostly due to relief of stomach gas responsible for preventing proper digestion.

Vanilla is a flavoring derived from orchids of the genus Vanilla native to Mexico. Originally cultivated by Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican peoples, Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes is credited with introducing both the spice and chocolate to Europe in the 1520s. Attempts to cultivate the vanilla plant outside Mexico and Central America proved futile because of the symbiotic relationship between the tlilxochitl vine that produced the vanilla orchid and the local species of Melipona bee. In 1841, a 12-year-old French-owned slave by the name of Edmond Albius discovered the plant could be hand pollinated, allowing global cultivation of the plant.

The first to cultivate vanilla were the Totonac people, who inhabit the Mazantla Valley on the Gulf Coast of Mexico in the present-day state of Veracruz. According to Totonac mythology, the tropical orchid was born when Princess Xanat, forbidden by her father from marrying a mortal, fled to the forest with her lover. The lovers were captured and beheaded. Where their blood touched the ground, the vine of the tropical orchid grew.

Vanilla was completely unknown in the Old World before Columbus. Spanish explorers who arrived on the Gulf Coast of Mexico in the early sixteenth century gave vanilla its name. The Spanish and Portuguese sailors and explorers brought vanilla into Africa and Asia in the 16th century. They called it vainilla, or little pod.

Vanilla is the second most expensive spice after saffron, due the extensive labor required to grow the seed pods used in its manufacture. Despite the expense, it is highly valued for its flavor and is widely used in both commercial and domestic baking, perfume manufacture and aroma therapy.

A major use of vanilla is in flavoring ice cream. The most common flavor of ice cream is vanilla, and thus most people consider it to be the default flavor. By analogy, the term vanilla is sometimes used as a synonym for plain. Although vanilla is a prized flavoring agent on its own, it is also used to enhance the flavor of other substances, to which its own flavor is often complementary, such as chocolate, custard, caramel, coffee etc.

The food industry uses methyl and ethyl vanillin. Ethyl vanillin is more expensive, but has a stronger note. Cook’s Illustrated ran several taste tests pitting vanilla against vanillin in baked goods and other applications, and to the consternation of the magazine editors, tasters could not differentiate the flavor of vanillin from vanilla. However, for the case of vanilla ice cream, natural vanilla won out.

In old medicinal literature, vanilla is described as an aphrodisiac and a remedy for fevers. These purported uses have never been scientifically proven, but it has been shown that vanilla does increase levels of catecholamines including epinephrine, more commonly known as adrenaline, and as such can also be considered mildly addictive.

Sweet potatoes are native to tropical areas of South America and were domesticated there at least 5000 years ago. They spread very early throughout the region, including the Caribbean. They were also known before western exploration in Polynesia. Exactly how they arrived there is a subject of ongoing research and discussion of various hypotheses involving archaeological, linguistic and genetic evidence.

It has been postulated that the centre of origin was between the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico and the mouth of the Orinoco River in Venezuela. The cultigen had most likely been spread by local people to South America by 2500 BC. The much lower molecular diversity found in the Peru-Ecuador species suggests that this region should be considered as a secondary centre of sweet potato diversity.

Sweet potatoes are now cultivated throughout tropical and warm temperate regions wherever there is sufficient water to support their growth. The plant does not tolerate frost.

Sometimes called a yam, the sweet potato is not in the yam family, nor it closely related to the common potato. The first Europeans to taste sweet potatoes were members of the Columbus expedition in 1492. Later explorers found many varieties under an assortment of local names, but the name which stayed was the indigenous Taino name of batata. This name was later transferred to the ordinary potato, causing a confusion from which it never recovered.

They grow well in many farming conditions and have few natural enemies. Pesticides are rarely needed. They can be grown in poor soils with little fertilizer. Because they are sown by vine cuttings rather than seeds, sweet potatoes are relatively easy to plant. Because the rapidly growing vines shade out weeds, little weeding is needed and farmers can devote time to other crops. In the tropics the crop can be maintained in the ground and harvested as needed for market or home consumption.

After harvesting, the sweet potatoes are dried in the sun for 2 to 3 hours. Then they are spread out in baskets lined with newspaper and placed in a dry area where the temperature will remain 80-85 degrees F. for 10 days to 2 weeks. After this curing period, they are placed where the temperature will range from 55-60 degrees F. with a relative humidity of about 85 percent. Sweet potatoes treated this way will store for several months.

In 1992, the Center for Science in the Public Interest compared the nutritional value of sweet potatoes to other vegetables. Considering fiber content, complex carbohydrates, protein, vitamins A and C, iron, and calcium, the sweet potato ranked highest in nutritional value. According to these criteria, sweet potatoes earned 184 points, 100 points over the next on the list, the common potato.