Plantain, the funny looking plant that seems to grow in every corner of everyone's yard, and that we liked to pop the heads off of as kids, is actually a really useful plant. It is chock full of valuable vitamins and nutrients - Vitamins C & K, Beta carotene (which the body converts to Vitamin A), Calcium, Allentoin and Apigenin (natural anti-inflammatories), and Baicalein (which helps repair the energy centers in our cells).
So, since there's plenty of it growing in my yard, I decided to make use of it.
First, I picked a colander full of the the best looking leaves from my yard.
Then, I washed them and lay them out on a clean towel to dry a little.
While they were drying, I got out my food dehydrator and set it up. This dehydrator has five trays and I put a layer of plantain leaves on each tray.
I turned on the dehydrator and let it run for a couple of hours.
When they looked like this, all dry and ready to crumble, I turned off the dehydrator and let them cool before storing them in a large plastic bag. I will add these to soups and stews.
When all my trays were full I still had some leaves left so I decided to make a tea with them. I boiled water and then steeped the leaves in the hot water for about five minutes. I thought the tea tasted somewhat like chamomile with a very faint hint of mint. It was very tasty. I didn't add anything to my tea but a little sugar would also be very good.
This was such a simple project and I'm sure I will be drying more plantain leaves as well as making more cups of plantain tea.
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