Culinary Herbs for Short-Season Gardeners,

Beryl Hamilton is a freelance writer in Thunder Bay who specializes in
home gardening.

This delightful book, created by two expert herb growers, would make a
wonderful addition to the libraries of novice and experienced gardeners
alike. As Deutsch explains in her introduction, “Most herbs are native
to southern climates, so they resent—at least a little, and sometimes
a lot—being required to thrive in a place they find downright
chilly.” Overcoming this difficulty is not, as the authors make clear,
as daunting as some may think. The book provides straightforward advice
on the crucial details of plant hardiness, on making the most of a short
growing season, and on the care of indoor and outdoor seeds and
seedlings. Particularly helpful are the charts stating the typical first
and last frost dates for representative northern cities (19 Canadian
cities are listed, including Whitehorse and Yellowknife). The
alphabetized culinary herb compendium, laid out in an elegant and
easy-to-read style, includes more than 50 species and over 100 cultivars
and relatives. While the book fails to provide a list of Internet
resources, the addresses of more than 50 mail-order nurseries are
included in an appendix, as is a lengthy bibliography for further
reading on herb growing and related subjects. In short, all the
information needed to grow culinary herbs successfully in a northern
climate is here.

Besides its value as a how-to manual and resource for growers, the
copious “trivia” and anecdotal material provided by Small and
Deutsch (much of it related to the use of herbs in folk medicine) make
this book a charming, engaging read for the merely curious. The entry
for “Dill,” for instance, offers the following: “In the Middle
Ages, dill was said to protect against witchcraft. It was also a key
ingredient of exotic love potions and aphrodisiacs.” Since the
descriptions of folk remedies in the herb compendium are meant primarily
as entertainment, those seeking authoritative information on the
medicinal value of herbs should, as the legal disclaimer warns, look
elsewhere.