Wonderful for lamb, beef, chicken, and minestrone soup. Perennial herb comes in our large 4 1/2" pots.
Rosemary is very easy to grow if you remember a few basic techniques. Native to the Mediterranean, it is best suited to humid coastal conditions with very low rainfall amounts and lots of sandy soil. We can recreate those conditions by giving it full sunshine withholding watering to once or twice a week and allowing the soil to drain/dry thoroughly before watering again. Indoors it is necessary to mist once or twice week to
recreate the humidity of the coast.
Rosemary will eventually become a 6 foot shrub, especially in mild winter areas and it is important to prune plants back every year to encourage new soft growth or rosemary can become woody. If winters are very cold a mulch is necessary to protect against freezing and covering the plant can help on very windy days to keep the moisture in.
To harvest Rosemary, cut off branch tips as needed and new growth will branch out from cuts. To dry or freeze some for winter use, hang in bunches in a dry dark place or just put whole cut pieces into a zip loc bag and freeze. Flavor is retained better if the leaves stay on the stems.
To use Rosemary in cooking, use it to flavor meats, on the barbeque, in soups and stews, Roasting meats and potatoes, with beans, or in Lemon-Garlic-Rosemary chicken. Be careful not to use too much, a little goes a long way.
