Today, I planted some Thai Basil seeds (bai horpha variety) because this basil has become quite hard to find around here. I can always get it in Vietnam, but that's a 40 mile round trip. Around here Thai Lemon Basil is very common, but it is good mainly for salads, not for cooking.

I also planted some Chervil seeds. This is the favorite herb of gourmet food and recipe writers, because they know you cant get it. This puts you on notice that you are not as good as they are. I'm not sure they can get it either, but they include it in recipes every chance they get. It is mainly used in France. Around here we can get the thicker stems pickled in brine from Armenia, where they are used as an appetizer and condiment.

Unfortunately Chervil is not well suited for this hot dry region. I can keep their soil moist and keep them in part shade to discourage bolting, and steadily harvesting the leaves is also supposed to help, but there's not much I can do about the heat. If these work out reasonably well, I'll plant a winter crop which should work better. Unfortunately, Chervil is an annual, I prefer perennials.

The Lovage seeds I planted a couple weeks ago are hatching nicely. This celery-like plant is a perennial. It was a very important culinary herb during the Roman Empire, but has fallen out of general use in Europe. It is still much used in Georgia and Armenia.

The Nora Chilis (Spain) and Reshampatti Chilis (India) are doing well, and I have transplanted them into larger pots and put them outside. The Noras have very lush foliage, but it is delicate and they need to be shaded. The Reshampattis seem to like a lot of sun.

Reshampattis are medium hot and the ground powder is my favorite chili powder, hot but not excessive, and with very good flavor. I ordered some whole dried chilis from India and seeds from them hatched vigorously. I look forward to seeing what they are like fresh.

Noras are spherical like Cascabel chilis, but have little heat and good flavor. They are impossibly expensive in North America, and available only dried. I bought a few dried ones for the seeds.

The Spanish and Portuguese brought chili seeds to Europe from Central and South America. The Spanish specialized in developing mild chilis, while Portuguese sailors carried blazing hot chilis throughout the world. They liked their pickled pork spiced up real good.

I planted a few seeds for Thai Pea Eggplants, and a couple of them hatched. While these are widely used in Thailand, particularly in soups, they are not actually native to Thailand. They came from the Caribbean, where they are known as Turkey Berries.

One of last year's Black Cobra chili plants is very vigorous this year and is keeping me well supplied with blazing hot Thai type chilis - much hotter than the ones in the markets, which are sort of disappointing. These are green if shaded, black if in full sun, and brilliant orange when ripe. They dry very well.

. . I can do a page on growing stuff from seeds, with pictures. I'll see about that.

. . we don't have to worry about spring - because we skip winter.

They're now wondering if they should be warning of the deluge for this winter. Global conditions are similar to when past deluges occurred, but it's too erratic to make firm predicions.