Wellness with Herbs

Two years ago, Elise Hanks turned her Kensington backyard into an herb garden. Her thirteen raised beds are crowded with plants, including burdock, stinging nettle, lavender, citrus mint, sage and calendula.

“I harvest a ton in the summer to give myself a nice big arsenal of dried products for the fall and winter,” Hanks says. She uses them to handcraft salves, shrubs, teas and tinctures, which she packs into boxes for her monthly herbal CSA.

A spring share from Terra Luna might include Hanks’s Clean Tea blend—made with nettle leaf (rich in vitamin C) and peppermint (an antioxidant that aids digestion)—or a blackberry-and-lemon-thyme shrub for cocktails. She works with a local collaborator to feature a special product each month: last April, she worked with Riverwards Produce to make fire cider; a wellness tonic made with ginger; garlic, onion, honey, cider vinegar and cayenne.

You can sign up for the CSA for three months ($120), six ($240), or a full year ($480) and pick up your share at one of seven locations around the city. She also teaches classes at local shops, like Moon and Arrow and Art in the Age, where you can learn to create your own herbal-tea blends or wrap sage and rosemary to make a smudge stick.

Terra Luna Herbals
267.551.1068
terralunaherbals.com