Lauren

It’s nearly March, which means (from a glass-half-full vantage) that it’s nearly Spring or (from a glass-half-empty one) that citrus season is nearing its end and that it’s nigh time for us in the Northern Hemisphere to bid farewell to (relatively) locally-grown lemons. Sigh.

You see, as much as I try to keep my diet in harmony with my region’s seasonal rhythms, I tend to make excuses for lemon. Sweet, sunshine-hued lemon, the only fruit that I consume daily, throughout the day in fact, starting my morning with a limonene concentrate and proceeding to sprinkle its juice on grains and greens, roast slice on top of chicken or fish, drop wedge in glass of water or cup of herbal tea. Come Winter or, for those experiencing the isn’t-it-over-yet blues, Citrus Good Times, I fill my market bag with the finest lemons that this region has to offer. And when the winds have shifted toward Spring, my hands can’t help but reach for those mesh-bags, y’all know the ones, brightly hued and filled with 10 not-always-so-fine-but-fine-enough looking lemons. And in Summer, seasonal-living-be-damned, I make lemonade.

I can’t quit you, lemon. And to speak, pardon my French, franc-ly, I don’t want to. But this year, I’m going to try to reserve the use of the fresh version of you and make more use of the preserved one.

Yep, that’s right preserves, or the results of preserving the bounty of one season for the next. Like curing ham in the fall, or making sauerkraut in the winter, or eating as many strawberries as humanly possible in June. The lemon is no stranger to the process of preserving and, like many other plant-based lacto-ferments, all that’s needed is some salt, a vessel and time.

Call them pickled or lacto-fermented or salt-brined or just plain ol’ preserved, these lemons will last far beyond this last stretch of Wint…, ahem, Citrus Good Times. And while they won’t yield even remotely…remotely!… palatable results for something like, say, lemonade, the combination of salt and time mutes the bitterness of pith and peel, meaning that preserved lemons are lemons you can eat whole.

The classic use for these lemons is in chicken tagine, but I find their uniquely-umami quality lends brightness and complexity to something as simple as a plate of 10-minute couscous. I’ve added slices to a pan of sizzling brussel sprouts, stuffed them in a roasting chicken, simmered them in a pot of spelt-berries all with equally lip-smacking results.

Let the Citrus Good Times roll!

Preserved Lemons

Adapted from Ottolenghi's "Jerusalem"

Ingredients

6 organic lemons (important! as you'll be consuming the peel); whole
6 tablespoons of course Celtic sea salt
6 lemons; juiced
1 sprig rosemary
1 sprig thyme
few dried hot peppers (optional, but delicious for us spice-lovers)

Directions

Cut an "X" in each lemon, cutting deeply enough so that it folds open, but lightly enough so that it remains whole. Rub 1 tablespoon of salt into the inside of each lemon. Place lemons into a sealable glass vessel, pressing down on them as you go. The lemons should fill the jar (if your jar is too big or too small, add/subtract lemons accordingly). Seal well and wait 1 week, storing someplace cool and dry.
Your lemons will have shrunk a bit by now and there will be some space at the top of your jar. No big deal! Add the juice of 6 lemons (or more, depending -- the goal is to cover the lemons with juice) and herbs and peppers. Add a pour of olive oil on top of the lemon juice. This layer of fat will protect your lemons from developing molds. Seal well and wait 3 weeks, storing in that cool and dry place.

After you've opened your jar, store in the refrigerator.

It’s high-time I come clean. I could always go for an herbal refreshment.

Full disclosure: I’ve hardly gone a single day this winter without one.

Y’all know what I’m talking about. Herb, those hyper-potent, dense-green stems and leaves that can be found far and wide. Weed, or “a plant in the wrong place” that grows in dewy patches during Spring. Pot, with which you cook the fresh leaves into a nourishing soup.

Sweet stinging nettle, you’re chronic.

(We were all talking about Nettle, right?)

Right. Stinging nettle, or, for ye Latin lovers amongst us, urtica dioica, is a major herbal ally for me. Yes, I said it, herbal ally, or an herb that you’ve found (or often enough, that has found you) to hold a kind of nourishment that is particularly beneficial to your kind of healing.

Nettle is an herb that has grown in every single country I’ve traveled. Two summer’s ago, after discovering Susun Weed’s Healing Wise–a delightful take on the restorative qualities of seven common herbs that are sometimes called “weeds”–I learned all the ways in which nettle is oh-so-nourishing for me, specifically me with almost every one of my ailments–arthritic fingers, weak veins, eczema–addressed by this plant. You can imagine my bemusement, when, last year, in Vancouver, I ended up renting a place with a garden with a planter filled with nettle, just as the seasons shifted to Spring (prime-time for the harvest of nettle’s stems and leaves).

During winter, when fresh nettle is a dream of sunnier days, I stay in touch with this ally through infusions of its dried leaves. Yes, infusions, not tea. The herbal tea you’re thinking of–bag steeped for two, at most ten minutes–is a world’s away from this herbal refreshment: one steeped for a minimum of four hours with a resulting liquid that is dark and thick, nearing syrup, and containing all of the nourishing properties that that herbal tea (or cup of warm, flavored water) lacks.

Nettle is a profoundly nourishing herb. It’s high content of nutrients like protein, Chlorophyll, vitamins A and K, the B-vitamins, Calcium, Magnesium and trace minerals Zinc, Chromium, Copper, Coblat, Iron, Sulphur, Silica are bioavailable meaning they’re readily absorbed by all soft tissue and working fluids in our bodies, increasing the ease and efficiency in which our circulatory, endocrine, nervous, urinary and immune systems function (Weed, 172).

Nettle is mainly known for its action as an antiallergenic, treating symptoms of hay fever, asthma and eczema, but its healing prowess is far vaster than that. It is, as Weed terms, a kidney and adrenal ally, a digestive restorative–for ailments ranging from stomach ulcers to constipation to hemmorrhoids–, a respiratory strengthener, a women’s ally–in reproductive and hormonal systems–, an energetic changer–Weed purports that nettle’s sharp energy “cuts loose old patterns and reweaves connections” (Weed, 173).

Nettle is like many other healing herbs. In order to benefit from its properties, you must consume a lot more of it than that herbal tea bag would lead you to believe. Like the cases of other nourishing herbs–say, cinnamon or ginger (yep, they’re considered herbs)–one teaspoon or one bag of Yogi tea will not have the, in cinnamon’s case, blood-sugar stabilizing or, in ginger’s case, arthritis-healing effects that a larger amount, taken daily will.

Nettle is gentle. On our bodies and on our Earth (because unlike say, cinnamon or ginger, it doesn’t have to be shipped to you from miles afar. It doesn’t have to be cultivated. It grows wild, perhaps even in your own backyard.) In the way that it heals, on a cellular level, bringing change over a long period of time. It’s exactly the kind of ally that I adore: daily nourishment from surrounding abundance.

I spent this past week in the mountains with my belle-famille for Geneva’s snow-break (a week-long holiday #Switzerland4thewin). Of course, I brought along a bag of dried stinging Nettle to provide my in-laws with my favorite herbal refreshment. My brother-in-law (salut Tanguy!) took a particular shine to it and I hope you do, too.

Nettle Infusion

Ingredients

1 ounce, or four full handfuls, of dried nettle

Directions

Place ounce of nettles into a sealable glass vessel (I use a quart-sized mason jar).
Pour hot water into jar until full and seal.
Steep for 4 hours minimum, or overnight.
Strain into clean jar and store in refrigerator (important, as the Nettle can spoil if left warm).
Drink liberally throughout the day, everyday.

Do not add honey to your infusion. It's the opposite of pleasant.

Nettle is far tastier served cool than warm.

I’ll leave you w/ this mountain artifact. Happy herbal-allying, friends!

References:
Weed, Susun. Healing Wise. Ash Tree Publishing, Woodstock, NY. 1989

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Last-Stretch-of-Winter Lemons

Herbal Refreshment: Nettle Infusion