Podcast 221: Herbs A-Z: Thymus & Tilia

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:00:14):
Hi, I’m Katja.

Ryn (00:00:15):
And I’m Ryn.

Katja (00:00:16):
And we’re here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts.

Ryn (00:00:20):
And on the internet everywhere, thanks to the power of the podcast.

Katja (00:00:22):
Woo-hoo.

Ryn (00:00:24):
So, we’re continuing on. We’re looking at the herbs on our apothecary shelves in the alphabetical order by their botanical Latin names. And today we come to Thymus and Tilia.

Katja (00:00:40):
I think it’s pretty funny that we’re still doing this. You know, we just…

Ryn (00:00:47):
It’s been a little while.

Katja (00:00:47):
This is just our home apothecary. And it’s not even, right? I mean, it’s like four shelves. Oh, five, because if you count the countertop. But there’s a darn lot of herbs on those shelves. Yeah. There’s a lot of them.

Ryn (00:01:00):
But we’re on the bottom row, you know. We’re moving along.

Katja (00:01:03):
Coming towards the end.

Ryn (00:01:04):
I think, you know, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, like six or seven more episodes like this, and we’ll be there.

Katja (00:01:10):
Wow. Well, I think it just… You know, you walk in. You look at the shelves every day. And you’re like ah, herbs, yay. But until you kind of decide I’m going to talk about each one of these herbs for however long it takes. Well, it turns out this is how many herbs there were.

Ryn (00:01:30):
Yeah. All right. So, we’ll talk about thyme and linden today. But before we dive into that, just a quick reminder that we teach herbalism.

Katja (00:01:39):
And not just in a podcast.

Ryn (00:01:41):
Not just in the podcast format, yeah. So, we’ve got courses. We’ve got whole programs that can give you some foundational skills and even advanced skills in herbalism if you’re ready for that. You can find everything we offer at online.commonwealthherbs.com. And we hope you do.

Katja (00:01:59):
We hope you do. It’s a great way to support the podcast. Our podcast is a great way to get to know us, to see if you think that you will enjoy our courses. The courses have video. They have audio. They have printable things. They have all the everything you could want in an herbal whatever, plus live Q&A sessions with us twice a week. Those are not mandatory. They’re optional, and they’re all recorded. So, you can go back and catch them any time that’s convenient. But we want you to be able to just talk to us live. So, we make that option available too.

Ryn (00:02:33):
Yeah. So again, online.commonwealthherbs.com. Check it out. All right. And then we just want to remind you that we’re not doctors. We’re herbalists and holistic health educators.

Katja (00:02:43):
The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States. So, these discussions are for educational purposes only.

Ryn (00:02:56):
We want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t exist as an objective standard. It’s influenced by your individual needs, experiences, and goals. So, please keep in mind that we’re not attempting to present a single dogmatic right way that you should adhere to.

Katja (00:03:12):
Everybody’s body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research and experiment with further.

Ryn (00:03:25):
Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. This doesn’t mean that you’re alone on the journey, and it doesn’t mean that you’re to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision when you’re considering any course of action, whether it was discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that’s always your choice to make. Okay. So, let’s talk about thyme. It’s about time. Ha ha ha. You know, you’ve got to make all the different jokes. Thyme is on your side. I’ve got thyme for that.

Thyme Steam Benefits

Katja (00:03:58):
It’s thyme for a steam.

Ryn (00:04:03):
Yeah, yeah. Totally.

Katja (00:04:05):
A few years back… I don’t know how long ago this was, maybe like three years ago, maybe four years ago. I had this great idea. And you went along with it so willingly. And I had this whole little script for a ridiculous little video about doing thyme steams in my mind. And I was like okay, you’re just going to sit there, and you’re going to look really miserable. And then you’re going to do a thyme steam, and then you’re going to look really happy. And then I edited it and put in sparkles and stuff. And it was the silliest thing ever, but we repost it every year around this time. Which reminds me, it’s probably about time to repost it. You know, just to remind people about thyme steams in cold and flu season, and now cold and flu and Covid season. Although – I don’t know – maybe covid season is all year round. I don’t even know. But it’s like one of the most popular tiny little videos we ever made. And you really had your acting hat on that day.

Ryn (00:05:10):
Yeah. But I think, you know, it expresses the way we feel about thyme steams.

Katja (00:05:13):
Yeah.

Ryn (00:05:14):
They are rejuvenating and wonderful.

Katja (00:05:16):
And they deserve all the sparkles or virtual sparkles. Don’t actually put glitter in your steam, because that would be weird.

Ryn (00:05:23):
Let’s not do that.

Katja (00:05:24):
No, no. Virtual sparkles. Imaginary sparkles. So, I think that if… Is this true? Hold on. I think it’s true. I think if I were relegated to one and only one herbal format, I think it might be steams. Which is cheating, because after a steam stops steaming, you can drink it as tea.

Ryn (00:05:52):
Oh, okay. All right. I see the plan here. You’re sneaking around and getting an extra one out of it. Okay.

Katja (00:05:59):
I am. But especially when we’re talking about respiratory health… Well, let me back up one tiny bit. The great challenge with herbalism, and I think this is true of many holistic interventions, is how will you get the herb to the actual problem? You know, you read about goldenseal – which is one of the herbs that contain berberine – about it being the herbal antibiotic. And you might think oh, if I ever have an infection, I’ll just take that instead of antibiotics. But the problem is that it doesn’t get into the bloodstream. The parts of the plant that are antimicrobial stay in the digestive tract. Okay, now listen. That is valuable, super, super valuable, because lots of infections try to happen in your digestive tract. So, great. It’s good that we have herbs that can deal with that. But those constituents never make it into the blood. So, if you have a respiratory infection. And you think I’m going to take a lot of goldenseal, and it’s going to knock out this respiratory infection. The problem is that the goldenseal’s never getting to it. Those two things are not coming into contact. This is why steams are so important. Because you are getting direct, on contact, antimicrobial action. And you don’t even have to wait for it to go through the bloodstream, the digestive system, the whole nine yards, and get back to the lungs. It’s just going directly to the lungs full power, total potency, right in there doing its work. And that’s fantastic.

Ryn (00:07:35):
That is fantastic. Yeah. And you know, when you’re doing a steam, you’re relying on the volatility of some of the constituents in the plant, which can fight infection or stimulate immunity or both. You’re relying on those being volatile and coming up in the steam, so that you breathe it in. I say that because given everything you had just said, someone might say all right, cool. I’m going to take that goldenseal next time I get sick. But I’m going to take it as a steam.

Katja (00:08:05):
Yeah, that’s true. That won’t work.

Ryn (00:08:08):
It won’t work. Because in that case, the antimicrobial elements in the goldenseal, they’re not going to volatilize. They’re not going to float on the steam.

Katja (00:08:17):
They’re literally too heavy. Not every part of a plant floats on air. Only the smelly things float. And not every single smelly thing, but the majority of the smelly things float on air. And so you can breathe them in. And that’s actually really cool too. Because when we’re done talking about steams, we’ll talk about all the things that thyme does that doesn’t have anything to do with steam. Because it actually has a lot more action. And we always just make time the steam poster herb. But there is actually a lot more that thyme is doing if you take it in different forms. It’s just that this is such a good one.

Ryn (00:08:59):
Yeah. Steam’s obviously very helpful for respiratory issues. But first off, that’s not just your lungs, right? That’s your sinuses, okay, and your airway as well. So, if those areas are congested, or there’s a lot of stagnant fluid or mucus in those areas, then thyme is going to help to motivate that up and dry that out a bit. You know? Thyme steams are also quite effective for issues in the ear and for issues in the eyes too. So, if you had a bit of an ear infection going on, you can set up a steam like normal. Breathe some the way you usually do, and then kind of turn your head sideways, and kind of tug on your earlobe a little bit and try to open the channel. Or you can work your jaw around in different ways. You know, like when you’re on an airplane and you try to pop your ears. If you are doing an ear steam, you want to kind of move your jaw around. Pretend you’re a cow chewing.

Katja (00:09:55):
I was just going to say, pretend you’re a cow.

Ryn (00:09:57):
Yeah. That works pretty good, right? So, those big kind of circular movements with the jaw, that helps to kind of change the shape inside the ear canal and allows that steam to get in there. And then for the eyes, like an eye infection, pink eye.

Katja (00:10:13):
Or if you have like a stye on your eye.

Ryn (00:10:16):
A stye, yeah. It’s like a swollen oil gland, or a lacrimal gland right there, or a little infection going on in that. But yeah, the thyme steam or other aromatic herbs will do the job. It’s really amazingly effective for those kinds of problems.

Katja (00:10:31):
You know, acne as well. All different kinds of acne. And that particularly because you’re getting like a two-phase action there. First the heat from the steam is opening the pores. And then the antimicrobial action of the thyme is getting in there and killing off anything that is causing trouble. And once you’re done the pores are open. And so you can do a nice honey mask, or a scrub, or something like that to help get any actual little particles out. It can be a really nice beginning to a weekend face care routine. Yeah.

Ryn (00:11:18):
Yeah. Okay. Now, like you were saying, we can obviously take thyme in a bunch of other ways than just a steam.

Katja (00:11:27):
We can take thyme for ourselves. We can take thyme for others.

Ryn (00:11:33):
Yes.

Katja (00:11:35):
It just doesn’t get old.

Thyme As Tea & Tincture

Ryn (00:11:40):
So, we can make tea, of course. And it’s important to say, actually, when you do your steams, bring a handkerchief. Don’t drip too much snot in there, and then you can drink the tea later.

Katja (00:11:50):
Yeah. Don’t drip into your steam, because then you can drink it. If you do accidentally drip snot into your steam, okay, well now you’re not going to want to drink it, but your plants will. Let it cool off first. But then you can water it into the plants. But yeah, there’s so much good stuff in the thyme that is too heavy to get into the steam but is still really important for your body. And maybe the first one to kind of focus on would be the pungent, bitter aspect, which is really, really helpful for digestive health.

Ryn (00:12:26):
Yeah. That becomes more apparent the longer you steep your thyme. And if you want to, you could even do this experiment, right? So, normally when we make a thyme tea, we’re going to do a short, hot infusion. And if we’re going to infuse it for longer, that’s okay. We just have to make sure that it’s really tightly covered, because we don’t want the volatile elements to evaporate and be lost. So, we can cover it up. But just as an experiment, what you might try to do is take some thyme. Make it in an open container. Pour on hot boiling water, and then leave it there for several hours. And then come back later on and see what you taste. And you could even make another thyme infusion basically the same way, but just for a shorter period of time or tightly covered. And compare the two of them.

Katja (00:13:17):
Right. The flavor profile is going to be different.

Ryn (00:13:19):
Yeah. So, the short ones and the ones that were covered, you’ll still have those aromatic, those volatile elements in it, the kind of typical thyme smell. Things like the molecule thymol itself, right, things like that are coming through.

Katja (00:13:32):
All the stuff that tastes like pizza. All the seasoning kind of flavors you’ll still have.

Ryn (00:13:39):
Yeah. But with the one that you’ve allowed those things to evaporate away… Now look, they’re not all going to disappear. Okay. I’m not saying that if you make thyme like this, it doesn’t taste anything like thyme in your food or thyme that you’re familiar with. But there is a shift for sure. And it’s both like some of those volatiles going away. And also some of those bitter elements emerging or becoming more forward as they are extracted from the plant material.

Katja (00:14:07):
Concentrating it as it steeps longer. Yeah. I think you’ll get more of the drying activity in that way too. Some of the drying action is in the volatiles. But there’s also just astringency in the thyme itself that are not volatile molecularly related. So, you’ll have that. And so that astringency will kind of remind you of black tea. It’s not like it’s going to be astringent like an unripe banana, but like black tea kind of astringent. Yeah.

Ryn (00:14:48):
Yeah. Right. And when we drink that tea… Say we made it. We did a short infusion. It still has a lot of volatiles in there, right? Those are still going to move around your body. Some of them are going to get to the lung. So, thyme is an herb that can help with this respiratory issue if we steam it, it can also help if we drink it. So, why not do both?

Katja (00:15:10):
And it can help if you eat it. Put it in your dinner or your soup too.

Ryn (00:15:14):
Yeah. Because these kinds of volatile compounds when they enter the body, you’re not going to sort of leave them in there forever. They’re going to make their way out again. And generally that’s going to go towards the lungs and then also some towards the urinary system. So, thyme isn’t really the first herb I would think of for a urinary tract infection. But if it’s the only herb that I’ve got around, I’m definitely going to prepare that tea and drink it up.

Katja (00:15:40):
Absolutely.

Ryn (00:15:43):
A lot of the same stuff we’re saying here would apply to tincture also. And tincture with thyme, it’s really forgiving. You can do it from a fresh plant if that’s what you have in your, your garden or on your porch pot array of growing herbs. You could also do a tincture out of dried thyme as long as it was dried well. And you know, what does that mean, Ryn? It’s dried well. Well, you can tell when you open the jar, right? You should be able to smell it immediately, and it should be potent. Ah, this is thyme.

Katja (00:16:13):
Yeah. And it should still be more green than any other color. I think a lot about quality of home drying. And a lot of people just hang herbs to dry. And that’s fine when you’re starting out. But the better that you’re able to dry it, the better quality that you end up with. And for a long time I did not bother with a dehydrator. And by long time, I mean like 10 or 15 years. I just was like oh, if I need it dry, I’ll buy it, or I’ll just not have it dry. I’ll tincture it, you know, whatever. And then I started wanting more and more of my own dried material. And finally I did get a dehydrator. And it makes an enormous difference over every other method that I tried. I think if you don’t have a dehydrator, the next best method could possibly be to put it in a brown bag in a car or some enclosed hot space. I’ve always been a little weirded out by putting it in the car. Because there’s a whole lot of other things going on in your car that you can’t see, like molecules from all the plastics and stuff. But I don’t know. It does dry it faster. But you can often find dehydrators at thrift shops. And they’re really widely available now. So, I super encourage you to just sort of be on the lookout for one when you’re thrifting or whatever. Or if you can buy a new one, also fine. But if you’re going to dry your own, especially when we’re talking about plants with volatile oil compound content, it does make a huge, huge difference.

Four Thieves Vinegar & Thyme Oil Infusion

Ryn (00:18:11):
All right. Well, okay. We can also infuse our thyme into vinegar. And you may have heard of some recipes, such as Four Thieves vinegar. That’s sort of a traditional like western European preparation involving aromatic herbs, basically pungent mints. I don’t think rue is in the mint family, but…

Katja (00:18:42):
No, but also nobody really puts rue in. That’s part of the old…

Ryn (00:18:45):
Yeah. That’s sort of the classic version, but yeah, it’s true. Honestly, every time we’ve made four thieves vinegar, it’s been thyme and rosemary and maybe some sage, maybe some lavender even.

Katja (00:18:59):
Sometimes people put peppermint in. Which, you know, when you’re making thieves vinegar, the purpose of it is not actually to be delicious. It’s fine if you make it delicious. That’s fantastic. But it is actually intended as a topical cleaning agent. And so it kind of doesn’t matter if you’ve got a bunch of mints with wildly different flavor profiles that are going to taste kind of weird next to each other. Because your countertop is not going to taste that. Or the wound that you maybe are putting it on – boy, that’s going to sting, but it’s going to clean it good – is not going to taste that either.

Ryn (00:19:37):
It does also give an aura of medicinality to the substance when you get your little shot glass. And you take your little half ounce of your thieves vinegar, and you shoot it down. And you go .

Katja (00:19:50):
That’s true.

Ryn (00:19:51):
Right? And then you’re like ah, this is working.

Katja (00:19:56):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So and again, it’s the same kind of strategy there. It is antimicrobial action on contact, whether that contact is a countertop. And it is fun. Vinegar is a great cleaning solution anyway, and that’s that many fewer chemicals that you have in your house. But it’s more fun when your vinegar smells nice with minty things in it. Absolutely. But it is really, really effective at killing germs on surfaces. So, yeah. That is actually the whole story of the thieves vinegar. I don’t know that this story is verifiable, but it is so widely told.

Ryn (00:20:50):
It’s an urban legend as part of the folklore of herbalism.

Katja (00:20:53):
The mythology of traditional western herbalism. Yeah. But the idea here is that in the black plague people were dying left and right, and their houses had all their belongings in them. And so these four friends got together. And maybe a couple of them were brothers or something. And anyway, one of them, their mom was a midwife and taught them how to make this antiseptic solution. And so they would cover every part of their body, and wear a mask and everything, and then go into the houses of people who had died of the plague and steal all their silver candlesticks or whatever people had. And then they would wash all that stuff in this vinegar. Oh, and they would put a cloth with the vinegar inside their mask also, so they were breathing that in the whole time. And then they would get undressed, burn everything that they wore, and wash their whole bodies with the vinegar. And the myth goes that that worked really well for them. They never died. I mean, eventually at some point they did die, but not of stealing things out of plague houses. And so the myth goes on that the local authorities, the French authorities, because this myth is set in France. The authorities took them, arrested them. They eventually caught them and arrested them. And said listen, we’ll let you go if you tell us how you’re doing this. And then the story starts to fall apart. Because it’s like one of those has multiple endings. Sometimes they didn’t give up the story. And sometimes they did give up the story. And sometimes they gave up the story and then got punished anyway. And sometimes they didn’t give up the story and escaped. And whatever, anyway.

Ryn (00:22:53):
Yeah. You can choose your own favorite ending on that one.

Katja (00:22:56):
Yeah, exactly.

Ryn (00:22:58):
Nice, cool. Thyme. Okay. And then we can put it into oil. Thyme infuses really nicely into oil, as many people who have made salad dressing can attest. It’s pretty straightforward. A pretty simple one there. So, again, fresh or dried, you can do your oil infusion. And why not? Make a salad dressing. Mix it with some vinegar. Toss some seaweed into there. All right. Now we’re getting somewhere with it.

Katja (00:23:32):
And thyme is not a very watery plant. Even if you just harvested it two seconds ago, it just doesn’t hold a lot of water. So, this is a kind of great beginner plant to infuse in oil – thyme, also rosemary – because both of them are already fairly dry when they start. So, when you infuse them, there’s a much lower risk of mold growing in your oil than if you’re putting basil or something like that in.

Ryn (00:24:03):
Yeah. And you could even take an oil infused with thyme and not just eat and cook with it, but you can apply that topically. It is going to convey that antimicrobial effect from the thyme volatiles. And so you could put that onto a wound, or some rashy irritated skin, or something like that. It is going to be heating, so not something too red and irritated.

Katja (00:24:28):
Yeah, and not something wet. It’s got to be just the right kind. It would be like a dry presentation of maybe eczema with a little cracking. And you’re worried that you’ve got some kind of secondary infection in there. And so you want you want a little moistening action because the overall presentation is dry. And you’re trying to get the antimicrobial action in there too, because you’re suspecting it. Yeah. So, that would be a really good application for it.

Ryn (00:24:56):
Yeah. And to be clear there, the oil is the part that’s going to moisten the skin. The thyme itself is drying. So, if we were to do like thyme-infused vinegar onto that tissue, that’s going to be very, very drying.

Cooking With Thyme, Moving Blood, & Sweet Heat

Katja (00:25:09):
Yes. You know, cooking with thyme is a super legit way to get your herbs also. And I think of cultures where every meal had a lot of thyme and rosemary and sage and stuff in it. So much was going on medicinally there. First off, yes, digestive stuff is improved. All of your digestive stuff – that’s the technical term – is improved by adding thyme and sage and rosemary and those kinds of things into your meal. Fennel. But also, like you said, eventually those volatile oils have to leave your body, and they are going to do that through the lungs. So, you are getting this sort of background respiratory protection all the time. And if you think about places in the world culturally where these kinds of herbs were included in all the meals, these are also places where it was kind of damp, and people dealt with lung infections a little more than average. Anybody has respiratory infections all over the world, right? That’s always a concern. But, in kind of damp places… Especially, I’m thinking about historic Italy where it’s damp. And maybe the roads are kind of narrow, and the people are all in the city if you think about history times. This also in historical French cities or historical British cities, people close together in damp environments. And so just all the time there’s always that kind of threat of respiratory stuff going around. If it’s just in the food all the time, it doesn’t mean that you’re never going to get a cold or whatever’s going around. But it’s like okay, well, we always have some level of background support going on.

Ryn (00:27:08):
Yeah, right. You know, one other thing that I was thinking about with thyme would be kind of less of a focus on the antimicrobial effects of it and more just on the heat and the blood moving capacity. So, if you were to take thyme, maybe make a good strong infused oil, and then prepare that as a salve. Now that might be something that you could rub into your toes if you’re a person who has poor circulation down to your periphery. and your toes get cold, or they turn blue. Something like this, it could really just be calling on the heat and the warmth and the blood moving effects of the herb for a problem like that.

Katja (00:27:51):
And especially if you put a little St. John’s wort in there too. Okay, if you’ve got any part of your body that’s kind of turning blue because of poor circulation, then that means that the nerve cells are also being undernourished. Well, all the cells are being undernourished, but the nerve cells in particular. And so that’s like a real setup for neuropathy. So, yeah. You could make a nice combination there.

Ryn (00:28:18):
Yeah. Thyme, it’s also just heating when you drink it, when you consume it. So, this is one of our stimulating diaphoretic herbs. It’s one that we would take… There’s a lot of plants that we could say oh, it’s diaphoretic. Or even worse, oh yeah, that’s a good herb for fever. Well, what do you mean? What are we going to do to the fever, or for or with the person who has the fever.

Katja (00:28:42):
And there’s so many kinds of fever.

Ryn (00:28:43):
Yeah, right? So, a stimulating diaphoretic, these are hot herbs. They’re going to raise heat in your body. They’re going to help you make a good strong fever, right?

Katja (00:28:54):
But also opening so that you get that good strong fever, but it’s not going to be a runaway fever, you know? Because you’re raising the heat, but also opening the window some.

Ryn (00:29:08):
Right. So, that includes plants like ginger and horseradish and even cayenne. But thyme is a really excellent herb for that kind of thing. And so that could be, yeah, all right. We’re in the course of an illness. We’re trying to raise heat in the body. We want to build up a good solid fever. Here, drink some tea. It’s going to help you do that. Oh, it’s thyme. It’s also getting directly to your respiratory system, right, stimulating immunity there, combating infection. So, it’s a really excellent herb for that kind of thing where a fever’s coming from a respiratory infection. Yeah. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this on the podcast before, but sometime in the last year I started making a formula pretty frequently that I mentally call sweet heat. And the sweet part is licorice and fennel and maybe some goji berries in a pretty decent proportion. And then the heat part…

Katja (00:30:06):
Significant is what you mean there.

Ryn (00:30:08):
Significant proportion, yeah.

Katja (00:30:09):
Lots of sweet is what you’re saying?

Ryn (00:30:10):
A fair amount. Not overwhelming, but a decent amount. But then the heat part is like thyme, and oregano, and monarda, and maybe rosemary, things like that. Hot warming aromatic herbs with some diaphoretic quality to them. And what I enjoy doing sometimes is to prepare this tea and make it real hot. And drink it pretty quick and generate a little fever for myself. To be like ah yes, I can feel my pores opening. I feel the heat rising to my skin. I’ve got to take this shirt off and put it over there. It’s a good feeling. It’s like ah yeah, I’m really getting my blood vessels a workout today. This is nice. Especially nice on a cold day. Or if you had to sit under air conditioning for a whole day, and then you’re like oh, I’m just like chilled in here. Whatever time of year it is, you can get that. You make this sweet heat tea. You drink that down. And you’re like ah, okay. Now I’m feeling good and warm again. This is nice. Actually, I’ve done it a couple of times when I was feeling really sore after an intense workout or a day of physical labor. And I was like all right, well, what can I do about this? What’s going to help is going to be blood flow, and circulation, and movement, and clearing away the inflammatory stuff, and helping the new building to occur. So yeah, eat some protein. But then let’s get the blood moving. Let’s drink some thyme, and some oregano, and some monarda. And get that circulation of blood from the middle up and out. Like up to the skin, out to the periphery, get that flow really happening. I feel like it helps. I feel like it’s a piece of the puzzle for reducing soreness from exertion.

Katja (00:31:55):
Sometimes I learn things for the first time on the podcast. For about that period of time, maybe somewhat shorter, I have been drinking a ton of lymphatic tea. And so even though usually, especially in the winter, we make one giant thing of tea, like three liters or something to drink together. For the last months, because I’ve been drinking so many drying lymphatic herbs, we’ve been making our own tea. Because those aren’t really awesome herbs for you to drink on a regular basis. But I am a person that runs damp. And I’ve been doing a lot of work on my leg health and my vascular health. And so that’s been really good for me. But so you’ve been making… Well honestly, a lot of times, a lot of mornings you’ve been making my tea. But then you’ve been making your tea, and I really wasn’t asking oh, what’s in your tea today, babe? We just didn’t get around to it, or I don’t even know why.

Ryn (00:33:04):
Yeah. Well these past few really hot days I’ve taken a break.

Katja (00:33:07):
Yeah, of course.

Ryn (00:33:09):
From this stuff for sure.

Katja (00:33:11):
But it’s just funny because first of all, you always have clever names for your tea blends, even if I don’t know that you do. Even if it’s just in your head, you always have a clever name, and I never do. And also that’s such a cool blend, and I didn’t even know you were doing it. So, here we all are together on the podcast learning about Ryn’s tea.

Silky Linden

Ryn (00:33:35):
Nice. All right, well, I think it’s time to move on and, and talk about Linden.

Katja (00:33:42):
Oh, linden. Well so, okay, here’s the thing though. Because that sweet heat tea, you mentioned licorice, and you probably also said fennel. Mm-Hmm. And those are moistening, but they’re not super moistening. They’re like middle moistening.

Ryn (00:33:55):
Yeah. They’re the sweet type of demulcent rather than the slimy type.

Katja (00:33:59):
Right.

Ryn (00:34:00):
So they can prevent a formula from being excessively drying. But they’re not really going to make it all the way moistening.

Katja (00:34:08):
Right, right. And those are the ones that are much easier for you to take. But you could put some linden in.

Ryn (00:34:19):
That’s a good idea.

Katja (00:34:20):
And it wouldn’t shift the flavor very much because all those other things have such strong flavors mm-hmm. But it would really moisten up the background.

Ryn (00:34:30):
Yeah. In that way linden is a very friendly demulcent. It’s kind of on par with violet. You can give it to people who have tried to drink marshmallow cold infusion and have vowed that they will never again touch such a thing to their lips.

Katja (00:34:48):
He doesn’t love it. It’s really hard.

Ryn (00:34:50):
No, that happens sometimes. Yeah. There are ways to improve it. And we’ve talked on the pod before about okay, you make your marshmallow infusion. But you also put in some licorice if you’re into that, or some fennel, or some ginger, or cinnamon chips.

Katja (00:35:01):
Chai spice.

Ryn (00:35:03):
You do an infusion there, and that’s more pleasant.

Katja (00:35:06):
You heat up and dry out your moistening.

Ryn (00:35:08):
Just a little, just a little bit, you know? Yeah. Some other flavors in the mix, yeah. But linden is nice. Even if you were to take a whole pile of it, and do a cold infusion, and shake it up real good, and all of that, you’re not going to get a thick viscous slime the way you are with marshmallow. It’s going to be viscous a little bit more than before. It’s going to be soothing and kind of velvety on the tongue and in your throat as you swallow and really nice if you have a scratchy sore throat. But it’s not snotty.

Katja (00:35:43):
It’s not snotty. Listen, if you’re out there thinking Ryn, what are you talking about? It’s really quite viscous. Just keep it to yourself because he likes it. So, we’re going to just stay there.

Ryn (00:35:55):
Yeah, or do a side-by-side comparison of linden, marshmallow, slippery elm.

Katja (00:36:00):
Right. Well, that’s the thing. You’re right. It is as viscous as it possibly can be without being slimy. And I think that’s the division. It’s right up there. And the next step that it just doesn’t take is slime. And the slime is the part that you really don’t like. But anybody who’s out there thinking no, it’s kind of actually slimy. No, we call that silky here. We refer to that as silky.

Ryn (00:36:27):
Silky. Yeah. And yeah.

Katja (00:36:29):
And yeah, because sometimes that’s what you’ve got to do to get the good stuff into you.

Ryn (00:36:37):
Yeah. There’s always an element of social engineering in your herbal practice.

Katja (00:36:47):
Yeah. Like palate engineering.

Ryn (00:36:48):
I do mean for yourself primarily, right?

Katja (00:36:50):
Well, also clinically. But, you know, everybody has different tastes. And not everybody is really very willing to just like gulp it down because it’s good for me. And even somebody who is willing to do that, why make something hard when you could make it easy? And so all the way around, finding the variation of the thing you need that is the most pleasing, or at least the least unpleasing, there’s a lot of value in that. And then whatever helps you in terms of the story that you tell around it. Whether it is like well, sure. Marshmallow is slimy, but linden is just silky. Whatever, that story is part of how you experience the plant too. And sometimes, especially if you’re a person who deals with texture aversions or flavor aversions or whatever, you can’t always talk yourself out of it. But if something is right on the line and still strikes you as kind of pleasant, then really having a solid story around it can keep it in that space and not let it accidentally tip over into that place where it becomes an aversion. And this is true… Right now we’re talking about it about linden because Ryn runs dry and also prefers dry things. And it’s not super easy and appealing to have a bunch of slimy moistening things. And that is going to be different for all people. But everybody has things that appeal to them more strongly, that very strongly do not appeal to them, whatever it is. And if you need that thing, then all the tools that you can possibly bring to find a way that you can get that thing are fair game.

Ryn (00:38:52):
I did put some linden into my tea blend today.

Katja (00:38:55):
Oh, did you?

Ryn (00:38:55):
Yeah, because I knew we were going to talk about it on the pod.

Katja (00:38:59):
What are you drinking today?

Ryn (00:39:01):
Oh well, there’s a little bit of linden and some tulsi. Which I probably could have put the thyme in there, but the tulsi was kind of drawing me a little more. Some St. John’s wort. And what was the other thing?

Katja (00:39:14):
Is there rosehip in it maybe?

Ryn (00:39:17):
Aspalathus linearis, what do you call that? Rooibos, rooibos, rooibos tea. Yeah.

Katja (00:39:20):
Yeah. I was like there’s something making it red.

Ryn (00:39:22):
For the red color, yeah.

Katja (00:39:25):
I am on day 325 of self-heal and damiana. Not really, but it does seem like that is my… I mean, I have all these different lymphatic blends that I sort of cycle through. But when I don’t know what to make… For a long time when I didn’t know what to make, it was just red clover. Now when I don’t know what to make, it’s self-heal and damiana. You know, because whatever. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been an herbalist. Sometimes you stand in front of your herbs. You’re like, I don’t even know. Just get something in the kettle. I don’t know what I want today. Yeah. Anyway, but linden.

Linden Identification & Community Support

Ryn (00:40:05):
Yeah, but linden. So, I’ve been doing a decent number of herb walks this summer primarily with the pharmacy students. And I definitely have noticed a habit of mine, which is to begin my herb walk under a linden tree. Because there’s like four or five different spots in the city where I like to meet people and do an herb walk. And all of them have a linden tree right near my favorite gathering place or pretty close to it. One reason I like to visit linden on herb walks is that it’s really easy to identify for most of the year. Anytime that the leaves are present – and it is a long span of time when the leaves, and then the bract, and then the flower structure is present – then linden’s so easy to identify. The main leaf, the photosynthesizing leaf is sort of heart-shaped. But it’s more like your actual heart because it’s a little lumpier on one side than the other. The edges have little triangular teeth around there. So there’s that main leaf. And then there’s underneath that something called a bract, which looks like a leaf, but it’s a paler, sometimes green, more often like a yellowish kind of a color.

Katja (00:41:21):
It’s like a lime green. Not lime the fruit, but lime green the Crayola crayon color.

Ryn (00:41:29):
Yeah. And then this time of year, they’re going to yellow before the main leaves do. So, you’ll sometimes see yellow bracts and still mostly green leaves. Or maybe not the most vibrant green, but they’re still green, you know? Anyway, so you’ll see that there. And it’s a different shape as well, right? It’s like an oval, like a long oval shape, smooth on the edges. And then from there extends a little stem structure where the flowers are there. Or again, at this time of year, the little fruits, which are these little green spheres hanging on the thing.

Katja (00:42:03):
Also at this time of year, I want to add too, is that it looks pretty ratty. Like linden looks very shaggy by this time in the season. All of the leaves are eaten up. And they’re still leaves, but they have a lot of holes in them. And also throughout the summer you’ll see a lot of different bug structures in the leaves. Different kinds of little galls or a little kind of the top of a witch’s hat kind of shape. The cone that’s kind of bent over. Except it’s red, but still that shape. And all of this is fine for the tree, actually. It does not really hurt the tree that much. I mean, it could become overwhelming, but linden can tolerate a huge amount of this. It is a community support structure. It is a nourishment structure. And a linden tree by itself is just an entire ecosystem. But as a result, by this time of year the leaves are not looking too ritzy.

Ryn (00:43:28):
Yeah. We would ideally harvest the leaf and the flower together when the flowers are at their most beautiful and fragrant, right? That’s the ideal time to harvest your linden.

Katja (00:43:40):
In early June-ish. And it’s funny because in Ukrainian, the name of the month of June is the same as the name of linden.

Ryn (00:43:53):
That’s cool. Yeah. Lypa (липа), I believe is how that is said. But that is the name of the month because that’s when the linden trees bloom.

Ryn (00:44:04):
It’s linden month, yeah.

Katja (00:44:05):
It’s linden month.

Ryn (00:44:06):
These kinds of calendars make sense. We’ll see how they handle the continuing saga of climate change. But that’s a different discussion. You know, the ease of identification for linden is a nice thing because if you live in a city, you might have some linden trees near you.

Katja (00:44:26):
It’s very likely. They’re popular in cities.

Ryn (00:44:28):
Yeah. They’re a popular street tree and in parks, in green spaces, and things like that. If you’re in Boston, I’ll put a link in the show notes but there’s a really cool thing, which is a Boston street tree map. And you can zoom in or you can even just put in your address if you’re in the covered area. And it will zoom right in, and it will show all of the trees that the city has planted along your sidewalk. And so you can kind of look at that map, or I guess pull it up on your phone, and then kind of take a walk around the block. And be like okay, I couldn’t figure it out from my guidebook. But we have state evidence here that this is a linden tree. And that one’s a Norway maple, and that one’s a ginkgo, and that one’s an ash. So, that thing is kind of cool. I hope other cities have a similar kind of a map available, because I think it’s really fun. And we often have students that live in the city. And I’m like all right, well, you want to get to know the plants who live around you. And don’t neglect the trees. And this will make it easy. So yeah, you can check that out and see what you think.

Katja (00:45:34):
I think that’s also awesome because city trees sometimes depend on city dwellers, especially if there’s a drought. Sometimes city trees need a drink. And so just anything that invites you to be more in relationship with the trees around where you live, I think that’s really cool. Okay, but linden.

Ryn (00:46:05):
But linden.

A Hug In A Mug With QSI Actions

Katja (00:46:06):
All right. So, usually when we talk about linden, we’re talking about the nervous system. And you know, we like to refer to linden as a hug in a mug. And we like to talk about linden in regard to grief, linden in regard to heaviness of the heart or weariness of the heart. Especially when there is also a tension component or a feeling of nervous exhaustion or nervous depletion. Or sometimes people refer to this as adrenal fatigue, feeling fried basically. Okay. But we talk about that a lot. And I’m sure in the podcast we have talked about that a lot. And so I want to focus on a different aspect of linden that I am thrilled about.

Ryn (00:46:58):
Look at that smile.

Katja (00:47:00):
I am, I’m so excited. That is that linden has quorum sensing inhibition actions.

Ryn (00:47:06):
Yeah. You’ve been excited about this for like two weeks.

Katja (00:47:10):
I’ve been like I can’t wait to do the podcast, so I can talk about the quorum sensing inhibition action of linden. Listen, linden is probably not a plant that you would think of as a potent wound care plant. But you should think again because it is. So quorum sensing inhibition.

Ryn (00:47:30):
We should have learned this lesson from marshmallow, you know?

Katja (00:47:33):
Yes.

Ryn (00:47:34):
Right. Because there was a similar…

Katja (00:47:36):
And they are in the same family.

Ryn (00:47:37):
Yeah, because there was a similar thing. Even just to have heard it said by another practitioner. Oh yeah, marshmallow is actually really good for wound care. Marshmallow can prevent infection. Marshmallow has the capacity to bust up a biofilm. That was a big surprise the first time that I heard that. But the more I’ve thought about it over time, and much more important than the thinking is the seeing, right? Seeing it work, watching it help. That’s been really impressive. And yet when you came to me and were like hey, I found this thing about linden with QSI effects. I was like oh, really? Wow. That’s amazing.

Katja (00:48:24):
I would’ve never thought.

Ryn (00:48:26):
So, you know,

Katja (00:48:27):
So, if you’re out there thinking this is cool, but what is quorum sensing inhibition? That is the ability of a plant to break up a biofilm. And so a biofilm is when pathogens… It’s not just bacteria. Everybody can do it. They all form integrated communities. They glom onto each other. And it is literally strength in numbers, safety in numbers. And so they form like a raft inside of the fluidness of a wound or in your body or whatever, and they begin to specialize. And so certain of the pathogens will be the ones who are getting food for the whole group. And some of them are doing… they’ll do different tasks. They literally are forming a mutual aid community.

Ryn (00:49:28):
We can learn a lot from these microbes.

Katja (00:49:29):
Yeah. And that’s not fantastic because it’s inside your body. And it can make you sick, and you don’t want that. Or inside your wound, and it can get infected, and you don’t want that. And yet it is still pretty cool that this is happening. So, very cool. But in order for a wound to heal well, we do need to break it up and have an immune response. The problem is that the human immune system isn’t very good at fighting a whole life raft full of pathogens at once. Our immune system is really meant to go one-on-one with pathogenic cells. That’s why they do it, right? That’s why they form biofilms is to protect themselves against our immune system. And so in order for our immune system to be effective against these kinds of infections… And this is where we get like antibiotic resistant staph infection and stuff like that. In order for us to be successful against them, we really have to break the biofilm up. And then we can go ahead and fight them all one-to-one. So, there’s a whole category of plants that have been tested for this quorum sensing inhibition, this ability to break up the biofilm. And a long time ago. I don’t know. You can email us if you can find the very first time that we mentioned this in a podcast. But I bet it’s in the double digits, like before we got to a hundred for sure episodes. Where I just really think that… Because the more plants that they study to see if they have quorum sensing inhibition action, the more that they find plants who have it. And at some point I definitely was like I think probably all of the plants have some of this ability, some degree of this ability.

Ryn (00:51:26):
Some capacity to do it.

Katja (00:51:27):
Yeah. And so we don’t know for sure yet because we haven’t checked all the plants. But linden has it. We checked linden, and it turns out hey, it’s there.

Ryn (00:51:40):
Yeah. I think that’s kind of cool. And it sort of says to me, never underestimate your demulcents.

Katja (00:51:46):
Why does everybody do it? They’re so easy to underestimate. Everybody’s like oh, well, it’s moistening, and that’s all. And we leave marshmallow there. We leave linden there. Oh, well, marshmallow, I mean, linden also gets it’s good for your nervous system.

Ryn (00:52:04):
And your cardiovascular system.

Katja (00:52:05):
We leave so much on the table with these plants because they’re moistening. They’re so lovely. They’re soothing. And it’s like no, they are powerhouses.

Skin Issues & Gut Infections

Ryn (00:52:18):
So, when would this be particularly important? Imagine a situation where you have some infected skin, but also there’s a ton of dryness in that area, right? This can sometimes happen even with a fungal skin infection like athlete’s foot, where the skin is flaking away or peeling away. Or there’s getting splits or like open areas in the skin as a result of that. And some of those spots are going to be a little damp, you know, if it’s really exposing the underlying tissue. But the overall state is going to be that dryness. And so you wouldn’t want to go and take thyme and do foot soaks in that, let’s say, and have that be the only thing you do, right?

Katja (00:52:57):
It would be too hot.

Ryn (00:52:59):
You might do a thyme foot soak and attack the infection. But then after it you have to do something else to soothe the irritation, and cool down that level of heat, and prevent too much of the drying effect from persisting. So, you could do a soak in thyme first and linden afterwards. That could be fine.

Katja (00:53:19):
Maybe you’re just really feeling raw and a lot of irritation, and you only soak in linden.

Ryn (00:53:24):
Just go with that.

Katja (00:53:25):
You skip the thyme altogether, yeah.

Ryn (00:53:28):
Or we could put linden together with a couple of other moistening plants. We could put some marshmallow in there, or we could put in some seaweeds. Because those too have some really excellent topical antimicrobial effects.

Katja (00:53:40):
This is also going to be super helpful for, again, for dry cracking eczema because it’s going to soothe the dryness. It’s going to lower inflammation topically. But also that’s the big risk with eczema. I mean, it’s just unpleasant. It’s painful. All those things are not good. But it’s compromise in the skin barrier. And so pathogens are getting in through those cracks, even if you can’t see the cracks. And so a nice soak of linden especially. I’m thinking about cases of eczema where there’s just a lot on the knuckles, or eczema that has psoriasis going on along with it. All of that. It would just be really lovely to have a nice strong linden soak. Put some licorice in there too, linden and licorice together.

Ryn (00:54:38):
Yeah. That licorice will add a bunch of direct anti-inflammatory action. So will the linden, okay. Licorice is a little more…

Katja (00:54:48):
But a broader spectrum.

Ryn (00:54:49):
Licorice is a little more intense or acute acting for inflammation. But yeah, broaden the spectrum.

Katja (00:54:56):
Yeah, because they’re doing it by slightly different mechanisms of action. And so you get many forms of inflammation fighting action and several forms of like pathogen fighting action. And just like you on any given day, if you have one thing to do and plenty of time to do it in, you’re like this is no big deal. But suddenly if 16 people show up at your desk or wherever it is that you work. And they all have a request, and they’re all different, and they all want it right now. That’s very hard to handle. Okay, well that’s what we’re doing to a pathogen. When we get that kind of broad spectrum of action by formulating multiple plants in our approach, then it becomes really overwhelming to the pathogen, to the infection factors.

Ryn (00:55:54):
Yeah. And you know, let us not forget, like you said a while earlier, that people get gut infections. Or that there can be pathogens that try to infect your gut, riding in on your food or other things that come in through the mouth. And so again, we don’t think of oh, I’m going to drink this linden tea to make sure that my guts are in a good state, and that we don’t have anything unfriendly that’s overgrowing. But in fact, that might be part of what linden is doing for us.

Katja (00:56:23):
I do not know if this is still the case. But in Germany back in the eighties and early nineties, if you were in hospital, they gave you linden and chamomile tea. These are two herbs that have very low drug interaction risk and very low allergy risk. Chamomile has a little more risk than linden, but linden has very low risk of that. And both of them have, you know, calming, anti-inflammatory, anti-infective, overall vulnerary kinds of action. And it’s kind of cool to think about if you are sick enough that you need to be in the hospital, that somebody’s also just bringing you tea. That a tea that is gentle but powerful all of the time. You’re just like oh, more tea? Yeah, that sounds great.

Ryn (00:57:22):
That seems good. When you go to the hospital in America, do they bring you coffee?

Katja (00:57:28):
Coke probably.

Ryn (00:57:32):
Okay. All right. Let’s leave that there. All right, very good. So yeah, so there are some fun linden thoughts for you today. All right then. So, just to wrap up, I wanted to put a plug for one of the courses we haven’t mentioned for quite a while on the pod. That’s our Materia Medica course. Which is a little similar to this series of episodes we’ve been doing now for however long it’s been. Materia medica means the medicinal materials. And so this this course is about the herbs themselves. Trying to look at each individual herb in as much of its multiplicity of powers as we can. Trying to do the opposite of shoe boxing or pigeonholing your herbs.

Katja (00:58:18):
Right. Trying to get in depth with all the different ways that every herb acts. So, instead of being really specific about just one kind of action, which we do in the Cardiovascular course. We talk about herbs from a cardiovascular perspective. And in the Digestive course we’re talking about the herbs, sometimes the same herbs, but from the digestive perspective. But we wanted there to be a place where we talked about the herbs from the herb’s perspective, just to give like a 360-degree view of each herb.

Ryn (00:58:54):
Yeah. To try and think about okay, well what are the basic qualities here? What are the flavors? What are the empirically observed actions of the plant when we take it? What does that mean for what kind of health problems it can help out with? And trying to see that in a broad sense. And to be like all right, well, often we talk about linden for the heart or for the nervous system. But hey, there’s these other applications for your skin or for whatever else we’re going to be dealing with. And we also talk there too about okay, so there’s lots of different ways to prepare this plant, right? This one’s really good for steam, and for incense, and for a nice hot tea because It’s thyme, and it’s full of those aromatics. This other one is much better as a cold infusion, or doing an oil infusion, or whatever else, right? So again, trying to just give you a broad understanding of the plant, so that it doesn’t get into your head that meadowsweet is good for migraines. And chamomile is good for gut cramps. And that’s the box, and the herb has a lot of trouble getting out of it.

Katja (00:59:55):
Yeah. Don’t put your herbs in boxes.

Ryn (00:59:59):
Yeah. Put them in maybe some nice jars or an airproof container. That’ll be fine.

Katja (01:00:04):
Yeah, that’s good.

Ryn (01:00:06):
Yeah. So, materia medica study is really valuable. It’s also a great place to begin. If you’re new to herbalism, maybe you’ve listened to a few episodes of the podcast. You think this is something you want to get further into. Then of course like this is a really good place to begin. In the context or as we go along teaching about individual herbs, we’re also introducing really critical concepts. Like the course begins with an entry on ginger. And so we talk about ginger, but we also talk about what is a carminative. Like what does that category of herbs mean, and what can we do with any carminative. And ginger is a great standout example for this and that reason. So, as you go through, you’re also picking up some information about medicine making, and some information about formulation, and which herbs are good friends to each other, understanding the connections between flavor and action. So, it’s a very rich learning experience, we think.

Katja (01:01:06):
Like all of our courses, it includes all of the video lessons, which in this particular one, this is a very large course. There are more than a hundred herbs covered. And it is a lot of hours of videos for you to peruse at your convenience. You have lifetime access, so you don’t have to hurry. There are also MP3. There are PDFs. There are discussion threads where you can ask your questions, and we answer them the next day. You get access to our student community. You’re invited to our live Q&A sessions. The whole kit and caboodle, which is quite a kit and all of the caboodle. Yeah.

Ryn (01:01:45):
So, you can find that as well as all of our courses at online.commonwealthherbs.com.

Katja (01:01:52):
Online.commonwealthherbs.com.

Ryn (01:01:58):
All right. I think I’ve got a good closing line today. But we just need to remember that sometimes you do want to take your linden tea. And you want to make a cold infusion and get it really nice and demulcent and slimacious. And sometimes you want to drink that down, okay? So, we’re just going to keep that in mind as we say that’s it for the Holistic Herbalism Podcast this week. We’ll be back with some more for you soon. Until then, take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea.

Katja (01:02:28):
Drink some tea.

Ryn (01:02:29):
Take your thyme and slurp your slime.

Katja (01:02:34):
Oh my goodness, you did it. You didn’t type it ahead of time, so that I wouldn’t…

Ryn (01:02:39):
No, I had to not give it away, yeah.

Katja (01:02:43):
Oh my goodness.

Ryn (01:02:44):
Okay. You’re welcome and goodbye.

Katja (01:02:48):
Bye-Bye.