Out and About in Dubai

The days and nights are starting to heat up here in Dubai. Most mornings I wake up to 30C (86F) temps. The balcony garden is going okay. Remember the sad looking rosemary? Well, the poor plant never took root so it died a slow death eventually drying out completely. I tossed it and replaced it with a smaller rosemary plant (top right of pic) which seems to be doing pretty well at the moment. I bent two of the branches into the soil to see if it will root so that I can get a second and third plant out of it. I’m thinking rosemary roast chicken and lamb.

Sage - I have two of these plants sharing the rosemary pot. I don’t know what to do with them except make stuffing but I’m sure I’ll think of something. Suggestions welcome.

Mint - You can also see the mint has flourished very well (bottom border of photo). Mojito time!

Basil - The Genovese basil (top left) suffered from spider mites. I sprayed the leaves with a soap and water concoction every couple of days for a period of two weeks and that seemed to have gotten rid of the pests. The sprayed leaves, however, did not look appetizing at all so had to be removed. You can see that one basil plant in particular has grown like crazy! I used some of its leaves last night on a tomato cucumber salad - yum!

Basil (Asian) - I bought some Thai basil from a grocery in Karama and stuck some of the branches in water. They rooted within a few days and I just planted them into soil (below). They are looking a little droopy and beat up but then again, the poor things have been refrigerated for who-knows-how-long, then stuck into a cup of water, and now into a pot of soil in the searing desert sun. I hope they will make it as it’s extremely hard to get Thai basil here. And a good Vietnamese pho just doesn’t taste right without it.

Thyme - In the middle of the basil pot is a bushy bit of compact thyme. I planted it there because I didn’t have room for it anywhere else. But I don’t think the thyme plant likes it there at all as basil loves water and thyme does not. So I have bought a new pot for it and hopefully it will take to its new home and flourish. Maybe I’ll make a bacon-mushroom-thyme quiche tomorrow.

Parsley and Cilantro - The parsley? Dead. It does not like the Dubai heat I guess. The cilantro seedlings would have died as well but I moved them inside the house and they are growing slowly but surely.

Does anyone else have an herb garden in Dubai?

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I have a small balcony where I have been trying to grow some herbs. Currently I have sweet basil, thyme, rosemary, garlic chives, spearmint, parsley, cilantro, and sage.
 

 

The mint, rosemary, and thyme I bought from the Dubai Garden Center. The mint and thyme are thriving but the rosemary looks a little sad.

Everything else I grew from seed and it took several attempts as the seedlings would sprout and then die. It wasn’t until I started giving them plant food (a product called Phostrogen as can’t seem to find Miracle Gro) that the little plants started to grow.

The sage and garlic chives are doing pretty well. The basil is growing but it looks like the leaves are being attacked by aphids or something as there are tiny red bugs on the underside of the leaf and white spots on the top:
 

 

My parsley isn’t doing very well either. It looks like the cilantro in the photo below but droopy and faded green. The cilantro I just started from seed again as the last batch failed to grow past one leaf. Keeping my fingers crossed that they’ll make it this time. Still in the one-leaf stage though:
 

 

So it seems that I’m not much of a green thumb these days. Here’s hoping that all the plantlings do survive and that I can use them for cooking soon.

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