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Thymus citriodorus variegata
Lemon thyme is one of my go-to plants in the garden. The variagated variety has beautiful foliage, the smell and flavor of the leaves are wonderful and it tolerates a wide range of growing conditions. In the ideal setting it would prefer well drained soil and full sun. However, the plant pictured above is in a moderate amount of shade (it gets about 2-3 hours of noon sun) and has grown well over the six months since I propogated it from my original plant.
It is drought tolerant, and in my experience lemon thyme tolerates a fair amount of abuse as well. I have moved the original plant after it was established. I have divided it twice. On a couple occasions after accidentally pulling off some woody material, I just treated the accident like a start and stuck it into soil, kept it moist and viola, I had a new thyme plant! Very easy to propagate. The picture below is the original plant. It is looking leggy right now, but that is most likely due to the fact that it is winter and it is still recovering from getting moved in fall. Come spring if I keep it trimmed down (very likely since I use it constantly), it will gain a nice compact, bushy form about 6″ to 8″ high.
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Ornamental Uses
Lemon thyme has a semi-creeping upright growth habit and will form a low mound as it matures. The young leaves are bright lime green, they then turn to a darker green and ultimately mature (about a year later) into the variegated foliage. It is a beautiful accent plant, useful in borders and is great in a rock garden. If there were a perfect place to put lemon thyme, it would be at the edge of a waist-high rock wall. Its colors would make it pop out against the stone and the leaves just beg to be touched and smelled. You can see in a couple of these pictures, the dark greens and bright yellows are a nice contrast to the bamboo border of one of my beds. It is also a useful companion plant for vegetables, as the oils in thymus spp. discourage some pests and inhibit harmful bacteria and fungi.
Culinary Uses
Anywhere that you use mint, try using lemon thyme either as a substitute or as a complimentary flavor. Also, for dishes that ask for thyme, you might try using lemon thyme instead. It has a very unique flavor and I like throwing a few leaves of it into practically anything because it brings an interesting accent flavor. Best of all though, it is wonderful in herbal teas. I make a mint, sage, basil, thyme and green tea fusion that is probably one of my favorite drinks ever. As one of the “world’s healthiest foods“, you can’t go wrong!
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For more information on thymes in general you can check out this article . There are many varieties of thyme, each with their own unique characteristics and flavor. It is definitely a plant worth experimenting with.
Lemon thyme is one of my favorite herbs, I have quite a few plants at different parts of the garden, I even grow them in pots. I notice that beets love growing next to lemon thyme. Have you tried added it to cornbread? I add one tablespoons of the leaves to the cornbread batter and bake.
Funny you should mention that, I just threw in some beet seed near the thyme a couple days ago, hopefully it germinates and I can compare it against other beet placements! Thanks for the tip and I’ll let you know how it goes.