Friday, June 6, 2014

Herbal Vinegars and dyed wool


My herbs are lush and ready. I thought I'd try making my own salad vinegars. Everyday, (year round) I make my husband and I salads for work. I'm getting very tired of the store bought dressings.

 
The first one I started with white wine vinegar, added chives, 1 garlic clove, a spring of thyme and a few black pepper corns.
They use to say let it set in the hot sun for a couple of weeks but now they advise storing in a cool, dark place, testing every once in awhile until you love the taste. Strain and discard the herbs and enjoy.



Next on the list is lemon balm.



White wine vinegar with lemon balm, lemon thyme, chives and black pepper corns.



This is a wonderful older book by Emelie Tolley, it's filled with lots and lots of wonderful herbal recipes.



I used this one for my next vinegar. It's a stronger more robust vinegar.



Made with red wine vinegar, garlic, chives, pepper corns,oregano, sage, rosemary, basil and parsley. Oh my, it sounds good!



 After a week processing, I washed out my woad fabric, I got a nice pinky tan.




The  Full Moon (money) plant gave some interesting prints. The leaves and seed pods barely left a yellow print.


But the wool has blue spots dyed into it. I have no idea where they came from, were they from the stem of the plant that I rolled the wool around? Or were they were left there by a passing Full Moon? That's what I'm going with!




Summers finally made it here and the flowers are beautiful. Have a great week.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

what pretty summer flowers and love the table mat...looks summery and cheerful! Deb C

Deb Hardman said...

I love your fabrics, especially the table runner.

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