When I open the nettles bottle to blend with other tea ingredients, it brings me back to the day that I ever so carefully hacked off the Stinging Nettles with gloved hands. (Stinging Nettles in named appropriately – it stings, just like a bee stings!)

For tea, allow the nettles to grow until they get tall, maybe 24-30 inches, but before they start to bloom. When they are the proper height, cut the plants along the stem with long clippers. You could always borrow a suit of armor if you know any knights in shining armor in the neighborhood. They might even cut the nettles for you.  Chivalry you know.

The nettles dry wonderfully in a food dehydrator. Although my dehydrator is named Excalibur, unfortunately a knight in shining armor doesn’t come with the Excalibur Dehydrator to pick my nettles.

Don’t have a dehydrator or a knight? No worries, read on.

Put the nettles in a large paper bag, staple the top shut and put on the dash of your car. Park in the sun with the windows closed to hold in the summer heat. They will dry in a day or two. Your car will smell like the earthiness of nettles for a bit, but there are worse smells. Once completely dry – that means stem and all,  the nettles won’t sting you anymore. Take the leaves off the stems, crumble the dry leaves into a bowl. Store the crumbled leaves in a tightly closed container and compost the stems.

Stinging Nettles is a nutritious herb, It is earthy tasting in tea and doesn’t have much flavor by themselves, so blend the dry leaves with other aromatic herbs like chamomile, spearmint, and lavender.  Create your own ‘tea garden blend’ by growing, drying and blending chamomile, spearmint and lavender.  Did you think a tea garden is where you drink tea?  No, silly, its where you grow the little tiny tea leaves to put in the tea.

As always, be very sure of your plant before you harvest and never take all that is growing. Leave some for a friend and next year.