Lemon Verbena Mint Tea

Oscar and I spent the weekend raking leaves and preparing my vegetable garden for the winter. I had not been back to the garden for a few weeks since I was avoiding my prep duties errr, I mean since I thought all the plants were dead. So you can imagine my surprise to find my lemon verbena and mint plants still alive! It must have been those unusually warm days in the beginning of October.

Knowing neither would last 5 more minutes now that the weather has truly changed to the drizzly Seattle weather we all know and love, I trimmed all the plants down and ran back inside to look up some lemon verbena and mint recipes faster than you can say avoidance! Of course I told Oscar that Ozzie was due for his afternoon nap and high tailed it outta there.

To my delight the first recipe that appeared was this lemon verbena mint tea from Simply Recipes. Perfect for the cold weather right now. I will try it the first chance I get.

Lemon Verbena Mint Tea

Ingredients
1/2 cup of fresh mint leaves (not the stems, they're bitter), rinsed, lightly packed (about 20 leaves)
1/2 cup of fresh lemon verbena leaves, rinsed, lightly packed (about 10-15 leaves)
2 cups of water

Method
Bring a pot of fresh water almost, but not quite to a boil. Put the mint and verbena leaves in a teapot. Pour the hot water over the leaves. Let sit for 3-5 minutes. Strain into tea cups.

Makes 2 cups.

I am thinking of drying the rest of the lemon verbena for bath salts. If anyone has a great recipe for that, please pass it my way.

*photo courtesy Simply Recipes