Marianne Willburn appreciates the bold and often vertical element that some favorite tropical plants add to her temperate garden. But maybe best of all are the ones that also provide that something extra: ingredients for cooking, which is her other passion besides gardening. I talked to Marianne about growing tender edible ornamentals, from turmeric and gingers to lemongrass and more.
Marianne, a longtime garden writer who gardens in Virginia, is a contributing editor to the collaborative blog Garden Rant, and is also the author of the 2021 book “Tropical Plants and How to Love them: Building a Relationship with Heat-Loving Plants When You Don’t Live in the Tropics.” I’m so glad she’s here today to guide us on which of all those tempting tropicals at the garden center to indulge in for visual and culinary enjoyment.
If you’ve got elephant’s ears or calla lilies, some Jack-in-the-pulpits in your shade garden, or maybe a philodendron indoors on your windowsill, you’re well...
Ken Druse and I both love leaves, and so do the naughty furbearing herbivores who have been visiting our gardens with a vengeance this...
Until I met today’s guest, James Young, early in 2025, it hadn’t really registered in my brain that some of the familiar annuals I...
