A prickle: Alexanders

Bramble & Briar #109

If this view was good enough for George Orwell and PD James, both of whom came to Southwold to write, it’s good enough for me. I wonder if Alexanders clothed the top of the cliffs when they were here, too? I was particularly delighted by the patch of brambles in the middle here

I wouldn’t be the first person to plant something in the garden that reminded me of a favourite holiday spot. But would it, I wonder, diminish my enjoyment of the sight of it in its more usual, if not quite its native¹, location? Familiarity breeding contempt, and all that, though ‘contempt’ feels a bit strong. Apathy might be a greater risk, but then, could a person ever be apathetic about Smyrnium perfoliatum, aka Alexanders – and not just because it’s a plant with not one, but two, splendid names?

Whenever we get away to the Norfolk or Suffolk coast, we can be sure of being welcomed by great pillowy chartreuse clouds of the stuff in flower – the same kind of zingy yellow-lime hue that euphorbias introduce to the border in spring, picked up some weeks later by Alchemilla mollis. This entirely edible relative of cow parsley (with its culinary correlation to celery) flowers at around the same time as its frothy white cousin and is just as reliably biennial, but is rarely found out and about in our part of Kent. It would need a firm hand – Kew Gardens found that cutting it back before it had a chance to go to seed prevented it from swamping the bluebells – but I’m a sucker for that colour, and am sure I could enjoy it anywhere.

Making the colour pop. Almost as though Alexanders had been designed to be grown in front of black-painted fishing huts

1. What have the Romans ever done for us? Introduced Alexanders to these islands, apparently, bringing it with them – along with rabbits and lettuce and viaducts (that must have been quite the journey) – from its home in the Med.