In the hills and canyons, the ceanothus is blooming like crazy, filling the dark green woods with puffy clouds of flowers, like exhalations of blue smoke from under the oaks.
Ceanothus is called “California lilac” but it isn’t a lilac, it’s a genus of the buckthorn family.
Ceanothus americanus is common in the eastern woodlands, from Quebec to Florida, from Wisconsin to Texas. In the 1770’s, during the tense run-up to the American Revolution, the bush earned a patriotic halo and its common name, “New Jersey tea:” Remember how the British parliament tried to save the embarrassed East India Company from bankruptcy, by ramming the massive glut of the corporation’s over-priced tea down colonists’ throats? Well, colonial women, who bought and drank most of the tea, were the engine of the economic boycott that brought on the Revolutionary crisis. Historian Rebecca Beatrice Brooks, at massachusettshistory.org, points to an ad that ran in a Boston newspaper:
“…We think it our duty perfectly to concur with the true Friends of Liberty, in all the measures they have taken to save this abused country from ruin and slavery; And particularly, we join with the very respectable body of merchants, and other inhabitants of this town, who met at Faneuil Hall the 23d of this instant, in their resolutions, totally abstain from the use of tea…we the subscribers do strictly engage, that we will totally abstain from the use of that article (sickness expected) not only in our respective families; but that we will absolutely refuse it, if it should be offered to us upon any occasion whatsoever.”
— Pledge made in 1775 by 300 Boston women, the Daughters of Liberty
“[One] notable Daughter of Liberty was actually a young girl, Susan Boudinot, the nine-year-old daughter of the future President of the Continental Congress Elias Boudinot, who made the pledge not to drink British tea and stuck to her promise. While visiting the home of New Jersey’s Loyalist Governor, William Franklin, she was served a cup of tea and after refusing it multiple times she then accepted it politely, crossed the room and threw the tea out a nearby window.”
Rebecca Beatrice Broooks, “Daughters of Liberty”
Colonial dames went even further in their revolutionary act, using Native American lore and their own ingenuity to come up with patriotic drinks to replace the socially important tea ceremony:
“One of the most common of these faux teas, or true tea substitutes, was the native American shrub New Jersey tea (Ceanothus americanus), also known then as Indian tea or Walpole tea. Leaves of raspberry also were commonly used for these colonial teas, as were sweet fern and spicebush. Bark from some trees such as sassafras and willow were used. Little did the colonists know that most the oil in sassafras bark is safrole—a compound now banned by the FDA as a food additive as it causes cancer in laboratory animals.
Dr. Leonard Perry, U. of Vermont
Common flowers used for the Liberty teas were sweet goldenrod (Solidago odora), red clover, chamomile, roses, and violets. Leaves of herbaceous plants such as bergamot (bee balm or Oswego tea), lemon balm, chamomile, and mints were brewed as many are today. Many herbs were brewed in the 18th century including lavender, parsley, thyme, marjoram, rosemary, lemon verbena, and sage. Native Americans introduced the colonists to many of these plants, which they often brewed to use medicinally.
One of the most commonly used was the lavender-flowered wild bergamot (Monarda fistulosa). While most of our current garden bee balms are of a different species (Monarda didyma), any bee balms can be used for teas. The wild species though, found in wild areas and along roads, usually has the highest oil content, so use it sparingly. Try a small handful of flowers and leaves per pot of tea. It combines well with lemon and honey.
Even some fruits were used in colonial teas, including those of dried strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and apples. Rosehips, rich in vitamin C and used today in teas, were used then as well. Some were combined, such as strawberry and apple. “Indian lemonade tea” was made from boiling the berries of the red sumac.
Often ingredients were combined, such as a common tea recipe of that time including equal parts sweet goldenrod, betony, clover, and New Jersey tea.
In California, ceanothus seems to have found its spiritual home, with a preponderance of species — over 60 varieties in California, and many commercially available hybrids. Most cultivars like the dappled shade/part sun in woodsy hills and ravines, and sip from the same wisps of coastal fog that the oaks drink in. Some are upright, some are bushy; some are low mounding creepers. The colors range from white, to elusive pale pinks and pale blues, to dark purple or deep Prussian blue. All have the remarkable ability to fix nitrogen in the soil where they grow; thus the preponderance of ceanothus actually helps make California the fertile and resilient biological hot-spot it is. (WHO. KNEW.)
One of the rarest species is the warty-stem ceanothus, considered endangered, Yet they thrive in Little Tujunga canyon, and some trees can be found of a very great age. I’ve spotted these as buckthorns but only recently learned they belong to the ceanothus genus.
They make fantastic patio plants, too — we’ve had little trouble raising them in pots. In the dappled light they prefer, ceanothus seems to take on a beguiling glow, as if lit from within by a pale blue ethereal light.
The Valley Village View 