A collection of Relaxing Nervine Teas

Nervine herbs help the nervous system. There are two types of nervines; stimulating and sedative. Stimulating nervines are what we most commonly use and know of. Stimulating nervines are those such as coffee, cayenne, garlic… and they stimulate lax or stagnant tissues via the nervous system. Relaxing nervines are what we will focus on. Relaxing nervine herbs relax constricted tissues via the nervous system. Depending on how tense your mind and body are, you can take these teas throughout the day and not just before bed…

Relaxing Nervine Herbs fall under the following categories:

Mood Elevator (Anti-Depressant)

Hypnotic (relax mind/ induce sleep)

Anti-Spasmodic (Relaxes muscle spasms)

Nervine Tonic (strengthen, nourish, restore)

Common Relaxing Nervine Herbs:

Chamomile

California Poppy

Hops

St. John’s Wort

Wild Lettuce

Lavender

Linden

Passionflower

Skullcap

Kava kava

Cramp Bark

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Keep Calm, Tea's On

All of the following teas are made for the intentions of helping reduce stress and/or helping get a good night’s rest. It is so often we find in the American culture, that people are stressed. In return, our sleeping patterns have worsened and so had our diet. I like to have a bedtime routine to help prepare my body for sleep (especially after a long, stressful day). Part of that routine is drinking a cup of tea between 1 hour and 30 minutes before bed. Perhaps one of these tea formulas resonate with your body and will help get you to a physically and emotionally relaxed state.

There's a whole assortment of tea formulas that can be used to relax the body. Each one of us react to plants in different ways (that's to be said about most everything I suppose). But I encourage people to try one herb at a time to experience the effect it has on their body. For instance, catnip works really well as calming, nervine for me. However, it keeps one of my friend's on edge and, in fact, gives her more energy when her adrenals are already shocked. I find when it comes to settling the mind and the body, people resonate with different herbs.

I'll list some tea suggestions for calming the mind and body. Try different combinations and see what works best for you.

Minty Nervine Tea

4 parts Chamomile

4 parts Peppermint

½ part Hops

½ part Valerian

1 part Passionflower

2 parts Rose petal OR hips

½ part Lavender

3 parts Spearmint

Adrenal Support Tea

1 part Licorice Root

1 part Valerian Root

1 part Burdock Root

¼ part Cinnamon

¼ part Ginger

&/OR ¼ part Spearmint

Anti-Anxiety

2 parts St. John’s Wort

1 part Oatstraw

1 part Lemon Balm

1 part Chamomile

1 part Valerian

Simply Calming Tea

1 part Chamomile flowers

½ part Skullcap leaves

½ part Oatstraw

½ part Lemon Balm leaves

½ part Burdock root

Sleepy Time Tea

1 part Chamomile

½ part Lavender

½ part Vervain

¼ part Hops

½ part Motherwort

½ part Skullcap

¼ part Red Clover

½ part Linden

½ part Passionflower

Calming Tea

1 part of all of the following herbs:

Linden

Hawthorn

Chamomile

Catnip

Lemon Balm

1/8 part Stevia

Bedtime Brew

1/3 part Valerian Root

1/5 part Linden

1/5 part Kava Kava

1/5 part Chamomile

1/10 part Catnip

Peaceful Feeling

2 parts Agrimony

3 parts Chamomile

1 part Passionflower

2 parts Peppermint

1 part Skullcap

½ part Spearmint

½ part Wood Betony

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How to prepare such teas?

In my experience, teas are how most people first become acquainted with “taking” herbs. It is still common to hear of people drinking a tea bag of chamomile or “sleepy time” tea when they need to rest and restore their body. Teas are an easy to understand and are a simple way to prepare herbs.

Herbal teas are made by steeping dried herbs in boiled water for AT LEAST 20 minutes, straining and drinking. It is important to use dried herbs instead of fresh herbs. The drying process breaks down cell walls thus allowing the medicinal properties to be extracted into hot water. It’s also important when making herbal teas, to add the water to the herbs and steep instead of boiling the herbs with the water. If the dried herbs were boiled with the water, then your tea will not be as medicinally potent.

And if you want even MORE medicine or healthy nutrients from your dried herbs, check out how to make a standard herbal infusion.

Ginger Bug Start-to-Tonic

It turns out, miss Hannah Peterson, will be my guest star appearance throughout the recipe portion of my site. Most likely because talking about food and fermenting is one of our favorite ways of communicating…

I also love and appreciate the recipes that comes through Hannah. And I think you will as well. The inspiration for this ginger bug recipe came from Sandor Ellix Katz, whom apparently was inspired by Sally Fallon’s Nourishing Traditions. It’s quite simple to grow your ginger bug and it’s also comparable to capturing sourdough yeast. The nest thing about fermentation is if you start small and things go right, a live culture wants to grow and will do so under a slow and steady recipe :)

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ITS ALIVE: a living ginger tonic

First, grow yourself a ginger bug:

1 cup water

1 Tbsp finely chopped ginger

1 Tbsp raw sugar (or regular sugar, but I think bleach is better to avoid)

Directions:

1.    Stir ingredients together.

2.    Leave in the kitchen (at room temperature) covered by a cheesecloth

*The inoculation works similarly to sour dough, wild yeasts floating around on their dust crafts will fall into the mixture.

3.    Add 1 tsp ginger and 1 tsp sugar every day

*By feeding it daily you are maintaining an environment that is welcoming for the bugs that will make your tonic bubbly and probiotic

4.    In 5-10 days depending on how warm and yeasty your kitchen is you will KNOW when your bug is active because it will be foamy and looking alive (or fermented)

Once this happens you are ready to make your tonic.

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Directions on making tonic:

5.    Boil at least 16 ounces of water and add green tea, honey, more chopped ginger, and cayenne. Let boil for about 3-5 minutes (until you can start to smell ginger).

6.    Let tea cool. Add 1 Tbsp turmeric and 2 Tbsp apple cider vinegar (until the flavor is to your liking).

7.    Strain the bug and add about 4 Tbsp ginger bug per 16 ounces of room temperature tea.

8.    Bottle (in old soda bottles if you want to be safe from shattered glass and don’t mind re-using plastic, or else, bottle in beer bottles)

9.    Wait 1 week (watch the bottle expand) and sample one.

**Be careful when opening because the bottle might explode!

10. If it’s to your liking put the rest in the fridge to slow down the fermentation, if not, leave it in the kitchen to further ferment.

11. Enjoy your ginger tonic over ice or experiment with adding lemons/citrus on a summer day!

My Favorite Banana Bread

I found this recipe on Heidi Swanson’s recipe journal (101cookbooks) and I fell in love. It has never failed to delight a banana bread fan. By adding yogurt, olive oil and eggs there’s just the perfect amount of moisture. For some reason there always seems to be white sesame seeds around my house, but never any black sesame seeds. Regardless, the combination of seeds with the ripened banana and my added contribution of walnuts adds a savory component to the sweet and nutty galore.

Feel free to experiment with different flours or oils, I’m curious how that would change the taste. And in the meantime, enjoy Heidi’s lovely banana bread recipe.

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Banana Seed Bread

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp fine grain sea salt
1 cup white and black sesame seeds

½ cup crushed walnuts
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 1/2 cups mashed, VERY ripe bananas (~3 bananas)
1/4 cup whole milk yogurt (or kefir or whole milk if it comes down to it)
1 teaspoon freshly grated lemon zest

OPTIONAL: ¾ cup chocolate chips

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350° F, and place a rack in the center. Butter and flour a 9- by 5- inch (23 x 13 cm) loaf pan, or equivalent.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, sugar, baking soda, salt and sesame seeds and combine well.

In a separate bowl, mix together the olive oil, eggs, mashed banana, yogurt, and zest. Pour the banana mixture into the flour mixture and fold with a spatula until just combined. Add the walnuts into the combination mixture. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and bake until golden brown, about 45 minutes. You want to achieve beautiful color on the cake, but at the same time you don't want to bake all the moisture out of it. So the minute you're in that zone, pull it, erring on the side of under-baking versus over.

Transfer the pan to a wire rack to cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn the loaf out of the pan to cool completely.