Friday's Herbal - Calendula

Common name: Calendula or Pot Marigold
Latin: Calendula officinalis

Ahh Calendula!  Such a pretty addition to the garden.  She blooms from June until the frosts come.   Calendula is an erect, hairy stemmed, many-branched annual, native to Southern Europe and North Africa. It grows to 18 inches, with yellow to orange flowers that can be from 1 1/2" to 4" across.  The flowers resemble daisies or chrysanthemums.  The blooms open in early morning and close at night.  The Latin name comes from the ancient Romans who noticed the flowers blooming on the first day, or calends, of every month.

Historically, Calendula was grown primarily for its beauty in the garden and its usefulness in the kitchen.  It was used medicinally to treat scorpion bites, headaches, toothaches and fevers.  According to the Doctrine of Signatures, the flower's yellow color suggested its usefulness in treating jaundice.

Calendula was also considered to have strong magical properties.  If you want to be able to see fairies, then:

"Take a pint of sallet oyle and put it into a vial glasse: and first wash it with rose-water and marygolde water; the flowers to be gathered toward the east.  Wash it till the oyle becomes white, then put into the glasse, and then put thereto the buds of young hazle, and the thyme must be gathered neare the side of a hill where fairies use to be; and take the grasse of a fairy throne; then all these put into the oyle in the glasse and sette it to dissolve three dayes in the sunne and then keep it for thy use."

This lovely flower can also help you to choose between two lovers, if you are having trouble deciding.  Take dried calendula flowers and mix with marjoram, thyme, and wormwood.  Grind these to a powder and simmer in some honey and white wine.  Rub this mixture all over yourself then lie down and repeat three times, "St. Luke, St. Luke, be kind to me; in dreams let me my true love see!"  I might mention here that wormwood was used the traditional witches' flying ointment.  It has hallucinatory effects.

Back to the Calendula....The bright yellow flowers used to be a common ingredient in cooking, almost to being used more as a vegetable than as a flavoring.  In England it was grown and cooked along with the spinach.  An Elizabethan cookbook called for its use in stewing lark or sparrow.  And you were wondering what to cook for dinner tonight!!

In Mexico today, Calendula flowers are used to adorn the gravestones on El Día de los Muertos (day of the dead).  It is said that the flowers sprung from the blood of the native people who were killed by the Spanish invaders.  These flowers are also a common sight at Indian weddings.

Today, an ointment of the Calendula flower is used topically to treat acne, bruises, rashes, and sunburn.  Calendula oil is useful for soothing calloused heels, and may help athlete's foot.  To make an ointment, crush the flower petals and mix with olive oil; let it sit for a few days, then strain and store in a jar.  Rub a Calendula flower into a bee sting to relieve the pain.

Calendula flowers are used in Ayurvedic medicine, and have been used in cancer research.  Its properties have shown anti-tumor activity in mice.  Calendula is anti-viral and anti-inflammatory.

In your kitchen, toss fresh petals into a salad.  Dry the flowers and grind to a powder to use as a yellow food dye.  A yellow fabric dye can be made, using alum as a mordant.

Use Calendula in your beauty routine by applying a tincture of the flower petals to your skin to treat acne, and to soothe dry skin.  It is also said to help chapped lips.  I think my next batch of lip balm will have Calendula oil added!

A tea made from the flowers is used for treating cramps, flu, stomach ache, constipation, and to aid digestion.  Calendula cream relieves hemorrhoids and diaper rash - good for butts of all ages!

As always, care should be taken when using herbs if you are pregnant or nursing.  Talk to your doctor or mid-wife.  Calendula can cause allergic reactions in some folks as well.

Calendula is very easy to grow from seed.  Plant the seeds directly in the garden as soon as the soil has reached a consistent 60℉.  Do watch out for cutworms and snails.  I had three 6 inch plants completely disappear between when I checked them in the morning and coming back to look that evening!  I started spraying them with a nasty concoction of garlic, cayenne, and dish soap mixed with water.  That did the trick!

Calendula likes full sun and average, well-drained soil.  Remove the spent flower heads to encourage continued blooming through the autumn.  Towards the end of the season, start leaving the flower heads.  You can allow it to reseed itself, or collect the seeds and then replant again in the spring.

DH's birthday is this weekend (even though he already got his present!); that means I have yet another chocolate cake to bake!  The problem with baking chocolate cake (aside from the calories) is my entire kitchen ends up dressed in chocolate.  I don't know how I make such messes, but I do.

Anyway, I am off to find a recipe for Schwarzwalder Kirschtorte  (Black Forest Cherry Cake).  I have a fridge full of cherries to be pitted.  That sounds like a very meditative activity.  I will sit on my front porch and pit cherries until it gets too hot:)

You have a great weekend!