Wildlife Weed of the Week: the Tansy Herb
using this bitter herb in cooking and to attract wildlife
These tall, graceful plants with their distinctive yellow button-like flowers seem to be everywhere right now. Aren’t they lovely! I have waaaayyyy too many photos of them on my phone.
These are the flowers of the tansy herb, aka bitter buttons, aka tanacetum vulgare. It’s an extremely versatile little plant. Today I’m sharing cooking recipes, as well as planting information, medicinal uses, some folklore and even mentions in Irish literature. Let’s celebrate the tansy!
Have you come across this plant in your wanderings? Do you have a recipe for the elusive tansy sauce? Share in the comments.
So you want to grow tansy plants as a wildlife gardener:
Tansy is seen as a nuisance in some parts of the world, but actually it’s really beneficial for different kinds of pollinators, ‘beneficial’ insects and local wildlife.
It’s also drought resistant and thrives on neglect - something I think we can all find very good to know as the summers grow more extreme and hotter all over the world.
“Also, most herbs are well suited to dry sunny locations. Some to consider adding to your low maintenance landscape are: Lavender, thyme, sage, tansy, catmint, hyssop, chamomile, marjoram, santolina, and artemisia.” - the Old Farmers Almanac
It blooms into autumn, which is really important for pollinators such as honeybees (I’m biased, I know, because I’m a beekeeper, but still). According to gardeners world: “It’s known for attracting bees, beneficial insects, butterflies/moths and other pollinators. It has nectar/pollen rich flowers.”
Tansy in history and herbalism and medicine
This herbs attract certain insects but historically actually the flowers have been dried and used in houses to repel ants and other ‘pests’.
In large doses, tansy flowers have been used historically to induce abortion. Wow! - Read more: How We Got Abortions Before Abortion Was Legal.
Also, as far as what they communicate in the Victorian language of flowers, the tansy conveys hostile thoughts & declarations of war. Double wow!
Using the bitter tansy herb in cooking
Using the bitter tansy herb in Irish and Belgian cuisine (as an Irish person living in Belgium I’m obviously super interested!).
In the Belgian coastal province of West-Flanders small quantities of crushed dried tansy leaf are traditionally used as culinary herb to spice up pancakes and omelettes. Find a recipe for this here (in Dutch): Pannenkoeken met boerenwormkruid
In the Irish city of Cork (which I’d like to stress is not the capital of Ireland), tansy was commonly used to flavour drisheen (a blood pudding). I can’t find a recipe for tansy sauce online at all. Shock horror. Only this:
‘Most often the leaves or stalks of the Tansy plant are used as an ingredient when they are young, tender and not fully matured. They are chopped into small bits to be prepared for salads, savoury meat fillings and stuffings, egg dishes, custards, and cakes. The leaves can also be used as a rub for poultry and meat prior to roasting.’ - Tansy.
Tansy in (Irish) literature:
James Joyce mentions drisheen a few times throughout his work and let’s face it, there’s no better man to be eating tripe and gross stuff than our good friend James. Read more here.
While he was in prison for gross indecency in consensual homosexual acts, Oscar Wilde wrote a letter to his lover, Lord Alfred Douglas, titled De Profundis, or ‘from the depths.’ It’s a searing, heart-rending, beautifully bitter piece of writing.
In it, Wilde conjures a world in which he can live at peace:
“Nature....she will hang the night stars so that I may walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and send word the wind over my footprints so that none may track me to my hurt: she will cleanse me in great waters, and with bitter herbs make me whole.” ―Oscar Wilde,De Profundis
While he doesn’t explicitly mention that the ‘bitter herb’ is tansy, I like to think that it is, simply because it’s yellow and that colour had huge meaning for Wilde & other writers at the time.
Thanks for reading! If you love this newsletter, get value out of it, and believe in paying people for their work, consider a paid subscription. Here’s the special discount link for annual subscriptions for you to use should you see fit, and until next time, and, again, thanks for sticking with me.
See you next week!
Jess
I love this plant, great to know more about it's history and uses. For me it blooms in midsummer rather then autumn, all the yellow buttons are gone over at this point!