Red raspberry leaf tea

While my son and I are visiting in West Virginia, I was reminded of something delicious from my childhood – raspberry tea! It was always delicious whether hot or iced.  What I found most satisfying about the tea though was that I picked and dried the tea leaves myself.

Thankfully since it is a little bit chilly in West Virginia right now I don’t have to worry about getting bit bit a snake while I go climbing in the thorny vines to pick the leaves off.  When I pick them, I always make sure to leave 2 leaves for every leaf that I pick because I want to make sure that the vine stays healthy enough to regenerate new leaves & berries in the future…I don’t know if this really matters in the Fall or not.

I ended up picking at least a pound of leaves which should equal a decent amount of tea once it all dries.

The leaves are air drying right now.  Once they’re dry, I’ll crunch them up a bit and will use them just like storebought loose tea.  Delicious!

I just searched online to get an idea of how much this actually saves me.  A 4 oz. package of loose red raspberry tea is $10.96!!

Grow your own tea

I’ve always loved herbal tea. To just sit back and slowly sip a steaming cup of herbal tea has always been one of the most relaxing simple pleasures that I have ever experienced. The cheapest box of 20 bags of spearmint tea is $2.19 at my local supermarket. This means that you are paying almost 11 cents per cup! So I figured why not try it on my own. I purchased a packet of seeds at our local Walmart for 10 cents of which I only used half of the package. I scattered these little seeds in a small plastic pot that was leftover from a boxwood plant that we had purchased to landscape our yard. This was about 3 months ago. Since then, we’ve already had one successful cutting which yielded enough for 23 cups of tea and I am headed out to cut it back again as soon as I finish writing this.

In order to prep the spearmint for tea, you simply gather the leaves in a bunch with a piece of string and hang them upside down until they dry. Once dry, just crumple the leaves a bit and store in a cool dry location in a sealed container (freezing is ok too). When you’re ready use, place the dried leaves into a tea ball and steep until you are satisfied with the strength of your tea.

I have not yet had to water it, fertilize it, or anything crazy like that. I just threw the seeds in, topped it with dirt, and walked away for a few weeks. This is amazing! Obviously 23 cups isn’t going to get me through too long so I wish that I had planted the entire packet but I will leave that for another day. This has been a great experiment in frugality!

By the way, spearmint is also a useful herb in dessert and alcoholic beverage recipes so it’s not just for tea anymore