In July our countryside takes on a brownish hue as a lot of the plants die or lay dormant until the next rainy season. However there are two plants that flower profusely during this month. Both of them produce brilliant purple flowers – advertising their wares to pollinating insects. One is our national plant – the Maltese rock centaury whose natural habitat is cliffs while the other is Wild thyme. The latter characterises Maltese garigue and is attractive to insects and humans alike.
In garigue, thyme or Thymbra capitata is a very common plant but because of the wonderful shapes of its woody stems people used to harvest it from the wild and use it to decorate Maltese cribs. This practice was so widespread that a law was enacted way back in the 1932 to protect the plant so that taking it from the wild became illegal. Thyme has many uses but please do not take it from the wild. You can get wonderful specimens of this plant in pots that will last for years from the people at ‘Gaia’ in Ghajn Tuffieha. Garden centres may not have the actual Maltese wild hyme but its cousin, the common thyme : Thymbra vulgaris which is not found in the wild in Malta.
The culinary uses of thyme arise out of its fragrant essential oils. The plant produces them to protect itself from dehydration, predation and infection however, strangely enough, we humans found the aroma very pleasing. Thyme is a potent herb so a little goes a long way. Use it in hearty stews and soups or with roasted potatoes. I find that is essential in any marinade for BBQing food whenever you need a Mediterranean flavour. The problem with Maltese thyme is that it is very woody and if it is used in soups one will get unpleasant grit in one’s mouth. The French, who have a solution for everything culinary, invented the bouquet garni which is essentially a small bunch of herbs which are either tied together with string or placed in a muslin bag and removed from the soup or sauce just before serving.
The innumerable medicinal uses of thyme arise out of the fact that the essential oil that it produces contains substances like thymol which are antiseptics. To soothe a sore throat take a teaspoonful of dried thyme or a tablespoonful of fresh and steep it in hot water for some minutes. When it has cooled to body temperature sweeten the infusion with real honey and use it as a gargle. One can of course drink this wonderful tea after the gargling is over. The medicinal properties of thyme are also useful for many skin conditions. You will find many ways in which to prepare balms and ointments using thyme as the active ingredient but I always think that life is too short to peel mushrooms so I take a small 100ml bottle of sweet almond oil (available from Maltese pharmacies) and add a tablespoonful of dried thyme. Let it steep somewhere dark for a week then strain it through whatever you have available (I use the paper from paper tea bags). Herbalists recommend this for treating many skin conditions of bacterial or fungal origin such as boils, ringworm and athlete’s foot.
The beauty of using the herbs around us is that many of them have been in use for countless generations and their safety profile is very well understood. Thyme is one of these herbs and seeing that it as been used for thousands of years one can rest assured that it is completely safe. Apart from this there is an indescribable feeling that one obtains from preparing one’s own products from the things that the earth gives us for free.
As usual I conclude with one word of warning: Wonderful as wonder weeds may be never depend on them alone for serious or life threatening situations. Modern pharmacy has given us brilliant treatments (many of them originated from plants) so it is always wise to consult a doctor or a pharmacist.