Hermitcraft: Labrador Tea

Last week I was down to the tea bog I've frequented for 50 years, and while there, under dark wet skies, I snapped a few (not very good) photos of its eponymous resident.

Labrador tea (Ledum groenlandicum) is a piece of North Coast heritage tea drinkers should get to know. This knee- to waist-high evergreen, which resembles an azalea that sets sprays of showy white blossoms in summer, monopolises peat bogs across the north of the continent. Its leathery leaves are narrowly elliptical, dark green above and rolled at the edges. Yellow fur on the underside makes this plant a snap to identify, as does the powerful, lemony aroma it exudes when crushed. In fact, your nose is likely to be first to discover Ledum after you unwittingly step on some.

As both the common name and binomial suggest, European sorties to North America encountered L. groenlandicum early on, and while the Woodland nations were already infusing it for medicinal purposes, the newcomers apparently were first to drink it as a beverage. On the North Coast it's particularly associated with the fur trappers and voyageurs of the pre-settlement period, who carried the tea-drinking custom west.

Lab tea is definitely enjoyable for that, though for my money it's even better as an anchor for a mix. I especially appreciate the added tang and colour of rose hips. Grand fir (Abies grandis) needles or sorrel (Oxalis or Rumex ssp.) are also good, as are dried liquorice fern rhizome (Polypodium glycyrrhiza), catnip (Nepenta cataria), mint (Menthe ssp.) ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and orange or lemon peel. A blork of lemon juice is often welcome as well.

My own mix looks something like this:

2 cups Labrador tea leaves, chopped
1/2 cup dried chopped rose hips
1/4 cup dried mint leaves, pulverised
1/2 inch gingerroot, minced
a bit of dried orange or lemon peel
1 cinnamon stick, shredded
1 teaspoon ground cloves

For a single cup, infuse a teaspoon of this mix in boiling water, or a tablespoon for a pot; adjust quantities to taste. Serve steaming hot, with honey and lemon if desired. (I don't add honey to most teas, but appreciate it here.)

Though Lab tea may be gathered year-round, the bright new spring leaves produce the best tea. Look out for poisonous interlopers such as bog rosemary (Andromeda polifolia) and bog laurel (Kalmia polifolia), which grow in the same habitat and vaguely resemble it.

Pick the leaves into a cloth bag and hang indoors for a week or so, tossing from time to time to promote circulation. (Ledum leaves retain their colour, shape, and texture when dry, so may not appear especially "dry" even months later.)

In addition to a warming libation, infusions of Ledum are high in tannin and other antiseptics, and so handy for stanching and disinfecting wounds and sores, particularly of the mouth and throat.

But there's no doubt that a finely-tuned Labrador tea mix is simply a source of great well-being. Sitting by the fire on a blustery November day, sipping this pungent golden brew, it’s easy to see why it symbolised self-sufficiency and contentment to Old Settlers, as indeed it still does in many aboriginal communities.

“I laughed at the Great Depression!” the old Puget Sounders of my youth declared. “Lived like a king on Labrador tea and clams!”