Several weeks ago, in direct defiance of a rule I made for myself not to invest in plants this spring when I don’t know where we’ll be this summer, I bought a basil plant. The tall rolling shelves that line the sidewalk outside the hardware store are towers of temptation and on a particularly warm evening, the scent of basil as I walked past before dinnertime, was too much to resist. Basil, I don’t have to tell you, is a happy companion for so many warm weather foods and on that particular night I was planning a pasta with spring peas and asparagus. It’s a meal for which a chiffonade of fresh basil is practically requisite. I brought home the plant, repotted it in a small terracotta planter, and made my first careful harvest.
Since then, I’ve tended to the plant sometimes carefully and sometimes forgetfully, though it has received a lot of attention. My children love sampling directly from edible plants nearly as much as they love roundly ignoring any harvesting tips they’ve been taught. Instead of pinching leaves tenderly from the top of the plant, they tug at random sprigs and masticate their fragrant harvest with a satisfied smile while working on their multiplication tables at the kitchen table.
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