Eating and Planting and farm realities

We started a new tradition at Lavender Wind Farm. Once a month we all collaborate on a lunch menu. We invite one or two special guests to share this fabulous repast. In November we had an Indian menu - I never would have imagined that we'd have feasted as well as we did. You can have a look at the table. Then, if you are lucky, and local, you might get an invitation.


Even thought we stuffed ourselves, we still went out and worked after lunch. Nancy has transformed the greenhouse to a friendly and over-stuffed place. Full of repotted plants that are getting reestablished before they are put out to grow over the winter. Nancy is one of the staff who comes to work every day with a huge smile and keeps telling us she just loved the work. That is so nice.

The only problem is, that we have to accept the reality that we are a farm that, like the plants that grow in our fields, we need to sleep for a while in the winter. That's hard on the employees because they get laid off until the income returns. The work is always there! I love the people who work here, they are the BEST!

Video on Pruning

I found out my little camera can take videos longer than 5 seconds (like my old one). It's not Hollywood, but it's useful to try to share some information that's too hard to share with just words.

We often get questions on how to prune lavender plants. Anyone that sells lavender gets these questions and some people have done some videos - this is ours.

Lavender Applesauce Cake Recipe

Here is a recipe that is getting a surprising amount of positive comments. Thought you'd like to try it out!


Lavender Applesauce Cake

3/8 C Veg. Oil
2 C sugar
2 eggs
2 1/2 C flour
1 1/2 tsp soda
1 tsp salt
3/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp allspice
1/2 C raisins
1 1/2 C applesauce
3 tsp lavender

Icing
6 TBL butter
1 TBL cream cheese
2 C Confectioner's sugar

Preheat oven to 350º

Blend oil, sugar, eggs in food processor so they are smooth and fluffy.
Mix dry ingredients in separate bowl.

Add applesauce and raisins together with the sugar mixture into the dry ingredients, and mix by hand., just until they are all combined, don’t over mix.

Pour into a 9x13 greased pan (or sprayed with vegetable oil) and bake for about 45 minutes (time depends on the oven, keep checking after 45 minutes).

Cool in pan for 15 minutes, then take it out and finish cooling on a rack.

Use the last three ingredients in the list for the icing. Blend them in food processor until creamy smooth. Ice the cake after it has completely cooled. If you want an additional treat add 1 tsp of Lavender Extract to the icing. Yum!

We have the Culinary Lavender and the Lavender Extract for sale.

Warm climate lavenders

The lavender family of plants is large. There are some that ring the warmer parts of the Mediterranean and go a little further south that don't even look like the lavenders that we think of as typical. They have a variety of names such as Lavandula buchii var. buchii, Lavandula canariensis subsp. canariensis, Lavendula minutolii var. minutolii, Lavandula roundifolia, or Lavandula pinnata var. pinnata. They have heads with multiple spikes, they don't smell particularly nice, although they do put out a strong odor. It might be that the smell is what helps them survive, nothing wants to eat them. The leaves vary, but in general tend to have a ferny look to them. They are tender, in our northern area we can grow them as annuals, but not perennials - or you can put them in a pot and bring them inside during the winter.

Distilling Lavender Essential Oil

When you get a bunch of lavender growers in a room and ask them about distilling you get as many passionate descriptions about the only way to distill as you have people in the room. At the International Lavender Conference in Cambridge earlier this month there were people from world famous lavender farms as well as much smaller entities, like ours. Henry Head, from Norfolk Lavender, showed off his distilling system that has been in use since 1933.

For those who are debating the issue of whether copper or stainless is the best, the vats are lined with copper. They are clearly very old and well used after having distilled their world class oil for over 75 years. Hanging is a top to one of the pots and a pusher that compacts the lavender in the pot. To Henry's left on the floor is the separator.

To get the lavender to the distilling room he showed us the harvester they have developed. The front part scoops up and cuts the lavender and it goes into the green bin behind. The unit is attached to a tractor, I believe, and harvesting goes quite quickly. Norfolk Lavender produces primarily an oil out of angustifolia lavenders, I don't think they do much with the hybrids (lavandins), but if you know differently, please comment to correct.

Day Four International Lavender Conference

What a great day at Norfolk Lavender. Henry Head, who spent the last 30 years building it up into a world class venue for lavender, lavender distilled oils, and lavender gardens, put together a fascinating day of tours and information sharing sessions. He brought in the perfumer he uses to create the scents for Norfolk Lavender products. I have to say, getting my nose to be able to smell the subtleties of the oils is difficult. Maybe after 30 more years of sniffing I'll get there.

Day Three Lavender Conference

Presentations today focused on using lavender essential oils for health care, both physical and mental. It was an amazing collection of information and case studies - much more research is needed, of course, but let's just say that there are certainly reasons to do the research because the potential for significant healing seems to be there.

The afternoon was spent with Dr. Noel Porter who trains people on how to use the nose to evaluate and identify aspects of lavender essential oil. He had kits set up with many constituents of the essential oil of lavender so we could learn to smell the different parts. Then we were tasked to identify them in a complete lavender oil. This was really tough!