The many moods of monarda (beebalm or bergamot mint)

(click to embiggen the pics please)

I can't think of another plant that has as many names hung on it as this one. But then again, it's a plant that has more uses than most, too, so I guess it's fitting enough. I like to call it "sweetleaf", most Canadians and British types call it bergamot mint, or just plain bergamot, Americans seem to call it bee balm .. which is confusing, since we Canadians sometimes call lemon balm bee balm .. see? It's crazy!

Monarda is in the mint family, but it's not a minty mint like spearmint or peppermint. While it shares the minty mints' nifty combination of heating/cooling sensations, it often has a spicy taste that is more akin to that other cousin in the mint family, oregano, and in some cases, monarda has a buttery feel to the leaves that as far as I know is all its own.

Take no prisoners

Ah, my faithful readers, your writer rages on. Against the machine, against its insidious tentacles that ensnare and enslave and pick our pockets and pick our souls to pieces like crows over a corpse. I rage against the insanity of our commodity culture, where we - our body parts and our sickness and our vulnerability - are one of the most profitable commodities of all.

To read the rest of this post, head on over to my new blog - The Angry Herbalist