Nettles, chickweed and dandelions are often seen as the bane of the attentive gardener, but Becky Cole credits them with helping her to achieve a happier, healthier life. The author of The Garden Apothecary is a regular forager, home herbalist and gardener. She also runs foraging walks, home apothecary workshops and classes in natural skincare for others at Broughgammon organic farm in Co Antrim, which she runs with her husband Charlie, when she isn’t contributing to Vanessa Feltz’s show on BBC Radio 2 or hosting her Nature & Nourish podcast.
“I’m really busy and I have a lot going on in my life, but I feel really good,” she says. This is not a given as Cole, 32, was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease, an autoimmune condition that affects the thyroid, when she was at college. The symptoms include tiredness, weight gain and dry skin. It is much more common in women than men, affecting about 1-2 per cent of the population, and there is no cure, though there is medication.
“It’s taken a long time to get here,” she says. “Healing is a really long journey — it’s neverending in a way. Even within the journey of healing, I feel like I’ve become a better person. My life is more sustainable and I have a positive impact on other people in the classes I teach.”
Cole, who grew up in the countryside near Avoca in Co Wicklow, was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease when she was 19 and studying fashion design at the National College of Art and Design. “I loved being there,” she says. “I was DJing too and I had a lifestyle blog called BeckyDazzler. My sister was studying English in Trinity and we were having fun, but I was burning the candle at both ends.”
Although she enjoyed her course, she found it difficult. “My mother, Lucy Doyle, is an artist and I grew up surrounded by beautiful, colourful paintings. But I don’t think that course was my forte and I found it incredibly stressful,” she says. “It was so misaligned with my skills and that’s when everything started to unravel for me. It was not a good fit.”
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Cole became so ill that she had to take a year off college. She went back home to Co Wicklow. “It was so nice to get back to the countryside and be in tune with the seasons again,” she says. “I had always loved the outdoors and nature. I was very lucky, I had a very wild childhood. I could run around. We had ponies. I could go wherever I wanted. I was really very connected to nature when I was younger.”
While she was back in her parents’ house to recuperate, Cole came across an old copy of The Illustrated Herbal Handbook for Everyone by Juliette de Baïracli Levy, a book she had treasured as a child. First published in 1974, it features intricate drawings and descriptions of common plants.
“I first found it on my parents’ bookcase when I was about eight,” she says. “I remember opening it up then and being absolutely fascinated. I would go outside and try to find plants. I used to love making up potions too.”
At that time, her father used to bring home bath bombs from Lush on Grafton Street. Cole would scrutinise the labels and try to recreate them. “I never thought that could develop into anything,” she says. “I thought it was just a passion.”
Although having an autoimmune disease was debilitating, Cole went back to college and finished her degree. “I wanted to prove to myself that I was getting back out there,” she says.
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After graduating in 2011, she worked in fashion and continued blogging. At the same time, she became increasingly interested in the slow food movement and sustainable living. “I was already very interested in slow living and that had only grown since I had been diagnosed with Hashimoto’s,” she says. “I started to delve into that world more and more.”
This led her to set up an interview with Charlie Cole, who had a small, sustainable goat farm outside Ballycastle. It was love at first sight, she says, and he persuaded her to move north. That was nine years ago and she hasn’t looked back since. They have two little boys, Rupert, five, and Toby, two and a half, and Becky has a new title: the Garden Apothecary. This has given her a new appreciation for what she used to think of as weeds.
“In my early years as a novice gardener, I would wrestle with garden weeds, waging what seemed like an impossible war against nature itself,” she writes. “Stubbornly hacking away at them with my blunt trowel and assailing them with choice expletives. However, my enthusiasm soon waned and using a toxic weedkiller was never an option for me, so I finally stopped battling.”
She let go of the idea of aiming for perfection and looked at her garden with fresh eyes. “I started learning about slow food, seasonality, what’s growing in the hedgerows, in the garden,” she says. “I felt myself becoming more rounded and happy. I realised that something as humble as the nettle, for example, is a powerhouse herb. It was just like falling
in love.”
Now nettles are a favourite and she credits them with helping her to thrive despite her autoimmune condition. “Nettles are rich in minerals and an amazing tonic for restoring general health to the body as well as enriching the soil,” she says.
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Greens, such as dandelion, cleavers and chickweed, are also surprisingly nourishing, she adds. Cole uses the abundant chickweed that thrives in the polytunnels and garden beds on the farm to make pesto.
There are easy-to-follow recipes for all of these weeds, a variety of flowers and other plants in her book. “I am never without jars of dried nettles, chamomile flowers, rose petals and elderberries,” says Cole. The salves and potions she whisks up at the farm are not very different from the ones she used to make as a child. “Now I look back and I can see I’ve come full circle,” she says.
The Garden Apothecary
Chickweed pesto
The key to making this pesto super-delicious is to use a basil-infused extra virgin olive oil.
What you will need
100g chickweed or other wild edible greens
50g walnuts
200ml basil-infused extra virgin olive oil
40g finely grated parmesan
1-2 garlic cloves
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
How to prepare
Add the chickweed to a food processor with the walnuts, olive oil, parmesan and garlic. Blend until almost smooth and season to taste. Use in sandwiches.
Sautéed dandelion greens
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Young dandelion greens are a great source of valuable nutrients, have cleansing properties, and are one of my favourite spring greens to eat.
What you will need
Butter or organic olive oil
1 garlic clove, crushed
A handful of freshly picked young dandelion leaves, washed, dried and chopped into thirds
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
How to prepare
Heat some butter or olive oil in a frying pan over a medium heat. Add the garlic and sauté lightly until soft. Add the dandelion greens to the pan and sauté until cooked through. This will take about 2-3 minutes. Season to taste and add a knob of extra butter or a drizzle of oil.
The Garden Apothecary by Becky Cole (published by Hardie Grant) is out next month, priced €18
