Stevia Dilemma

My stevia plant is over 4 feet tall right now. I'm at a loss as to what do with the leaves. I thought I'd read that they tend to take on a bitter aftertaste when dried. I wonder if I can steep them in an alcohol of some kind and extract the sweetness that way. Must do some googling.

Getting Back on My Feet

This weekend was the first time since Wednesday that I was able to get out of bed. Ironic that as temperatures were getting into the upper 80's, I was coming down with the worst case of the flu I've had in a very long time. As a result, I'm completely behind schedule on all of my gardening work and blogging. I had wanted to have a large section of lawn ripped up by now. I guess that will just have to wait until next weekend. Hopefully I'll be back to my usual self soon.


My newly purchased mandarinquat and Seville orange trees are blooming at the moment. It's interesting to see how the flowers differentiate from my Meyer Lemon. The mandarinquat blossom (top) is particularly interesting I think. At the moment, I'm battling tiny gnats that have seemingly sprung up from the soil mix that came with the trees. As a result, they have been spending most of their time outdoors. Soon, the rest of the citrus will follow suit.

In other news, I'm still battling the green aphids that came with my Chrysanthemum tea plants. I've found clusters of them on my eggplants, Roselle and artichokes. Aphids are easily killed individually or when found in clusters but difficult to eradicate completely. Hopefully they won't take hold in the garden. When the weather gets warmer, I will introduce a biological agent (like ladybugs) to help keep their numbers in check. The more I think about it, the more annoyed I am that a company would send me infected plants.

A couple of weeks ago, I purchased a Stevia plant (sweet leaf, sugar leaf). I've been meaning to write about this embattled herb for a while now. The leaves of the Stevia plant are naturally sweet, and extracts made from the plant are 300 times sweeter than sugar. No wonder the artificial sweetener industry worked so hard for decades to get Stevia banned as a sugar-substitute in this country. Hopefully things will slowly change now that Coca-Cola and Pepsi have expressed an interest in Stevia. I don't know about you but all of this sounds completely disheartening to me. Just another example of how our "free" markets can sometimes take away our freedom of choice.

Finally, I can't wait to catch up on all of your blogs. I don't mean to be neglecting my blogging friends. Hopefully, I'll be able to kick this illness soon.