What is the most difficult part of your job?

What’s the most rewarding part?
Teaching. I’m a born teacher. I’ll do it to perfect strangers.

If your philosophy regarding herbs and herbal cooking could be stated in a few words, what would they be?
Use ‘em, use ‘em, use ‘em.
Jump in and don’t worry about recipes and don’t worry about herb charts.

Then why? Why should people use herbs?

What health benefits you believe come with the use of herbs?
A lot of people through the years at Hilltop, particularly since this was during the hippie days and people discovered a lot of things along with marijuana that were going to give them perfect health and Nirvana and all other such nonsense. People would come and say "Now, what kind of herbs to you take?" I would say... "I’m not sick. I don’t need to take anything." Just like any medicine, some (herbs) can cure you and some can kill you... I don’t believe in self-diagnosis.

What’s it like to live here?
It’s like living in a museum. We don’t put a nail in the wall.

What are the staff meals like?
It’s so interesting, the conversations that go on around the dinner table. These are some of the most widely educated people... the scope of their education in history, music, literature is amazing. The conversations are lively to say the least. They’re all very appreciative...of everyone else. They are very enthusiastic and very interested and that makes you feel appreciated. Everyone is very busy and yet not too busy to listen...It is a very interesting group...It is never dull.

What do you want people to know?
Make sure that people know the gardens...beside the Menke House, are open. All of the Roman "ruins" that we have "discovered" in our archeological dig... are herb and perennial gardens. We brought a very large collection. Across the way, we expect it to be...like a botanical garden...with theme gardens, Shakespeare plants and gardens organized by colors, that sort of thing.

The Magic of Herbs

(From Spring 1997 issue of the Register)

That's Madalene Hill talking. When it comes to herbs and herbal gardening, she's a lady who knows what she's talking about. She and her daughter, Gwen Barclay, ran the highly regarded Hilltop Herb Farm, a restaurant and herb farm outside Cleveland, Texas, for many years and are two of the most respected experts on the subject in the nation. Gwen, who serves as the Director of Food Service at the International Festival-Institute at Round Top and is a talented chef, known particularly for her use of fresh herbs in her dishes.

The two together wrote the book Southern Herb Growing which is a revered tome to herbalists below the Mason-Dixon line. They are also two of the three founders of the Round Top Herb Festival and are the master horticulturists behind the amazing herbal gardens at the Festival-Institute.

We sat around a table in the Menke House. Gwen still had her apron on and Madalene was licking envelopes press releases promoting concert events and the upcoming Herb Festival.

Register Tell me something about the history of herbs as both culinary and medicinal plants.

Madalene Herbs around the world are not used as medicinal herbs and culinary herbs. They are a way of life. Every day they go into the food and the beverages and they are just considered a way of life. They make take a cup of sage tea once a week for the medicinal quality of it or chamomile tea for the baby's colic, but they become a way of life...just the way I grew up with them.

Gwen One of the things we feel very strongly about is not separating culinary herbs from medicinal herbs....All the culinary herbs have medicinal value. We feel that if people used more of the culinary herbs, particularly in the fresh form...lots of them in your diet all the time as seasonings. You get all these nutritive values. You get the anti"oxidant characteristics...we are hearing so much about. You get vitamins and minerals (in minute amounts)

Register Is information about herbs predominantly an oral tradition or is much of it written?

Madalene I'm sure it was an oral tradition at one time and in some parts of the world still is. So many parts of the world depend on the plants for medicine...,and this is all through the shamans and the witch doctors and the curanderos. But herbs for medicine have been printed many, many centuries.

Gwen Some of the earliest books were "Herbals." Some came out of monasteries. Some came out of the chatelaine, the mistress of the manor, the receipt book, it was called.

Madalene The written materials are very old.

Gwen ...before printing presses

Madalene In the 1500's, during Shakespeare's time, there were so very many herbals written. In fact, Gerard, a famous one (herbalist) lived right across the street from Shakespeare. They feel, that because of his friendship he was influenced (in his writing). He used the plants, herbs and flowers and trees and shrubs to emphasize the idiosyncrasies... the foibles, of mankind.

Gwen That was quite common before written language was common...that people used the symbolism of plants...

Madalene ...in the doctrine of signatures for the medicine plants, they believed a leaf that had spots on it was used for a lung problem, a kidney shaped leaf was used for a kidney problem. Many of those things are true. Many are diuretic and so could possibly be used.

Register Later, even in Western culture...there's an oral tradition among these people...even in America, each parent passes on remedies...

Gwen It's true. With the herbal medicine. It was definitely a handed down tradition. Historically, people did not diagnose themselves and treat themselves with herbs. You went, in the Latin culture, the curandero or the herb woman or herb man or the Yarb. You didn't treat yourself though and this is where people get into trouble. They diagnose themselves and then they go to the health food store and buy all these things they don't know a hoot about. That was never the way they were used. It was someone who had learned from someone very knowledgeable.

Madalene That is particularly true with all the interest in the alternative medicine. People are getting some of their information from very kooky books. Someone has written them who really doesn't know what he's talking about. They have picked up information here and here which is bad information. There are some very good books that are available.

Register Are there any particular books on medicinal herbs that you recommend?

Gwen A Modern Herbal by the venerable English author, Mrs. Maude Grieve, which has been reprinted by Dover Press and two by Dr. Varro Tyler, P.H.D.ScD., Lilly Distinguished Professor of Pharmacognosy at Purdue University, Herbs of Choice and The Honest Herbal.

Madalene The first rule...in herbal medicine is that you have to believe that it's going to help you... if the perception is that you're going to be better, then you certainly are. You can relax and the headache goes away. Those kinds of things (herbs used as placebos) are interesting but not harmful..., but there are some really dangerous things available.

Register There is a mythology that says, much like the science of the Egyptians, much herbal lore is lost. That in times when people relied more heavily on herbs, they developed more extensive oral traditions and that much of that has been lost. Is this true?

Madalene None of it has been lost. The South American Indians, the Mayas, the Incas, the Aztecs and the Egyptians, the Greeks all...

Gwen ...now, of course, some of the people who have had little contact with the outside world, such as tribes in South America, ...and I suppose, yes, some of those very small tribes and plants that are indigenous just to those areas...if they died out. Both the plants and the people and one is in as much danger as the other.

Register So, most of the body of that knowledge has been passed down pretty rigorously and is still available.

Madalene There's still lots of it, particularly in South America, in the rain forests, in Africa and in the Orient. All of it hasn't been documented. Now we know where these people are in the rain forests and about the plants that are being lost.

Gwen I don't believe you should say we think there is none lost, but in Western culture, very little is lost.

Register People think that just because herbs are natural they are good for you. What about that?

Madalene Of course, that's a marketing ploy. People sell things by calling them natural.

Gwen It is now being documented and being looked at under the microscope, and in some cases they are finding that...things they thought would help...do a good job and sometimes, they find that whatever it was that would do the job (serve as medicine) is not even in the plant...

Madalene ...and by the same token, they have found some of those things that have been used for hundreds of years, comfrey, sassafras, and they now know what's in them. They are very toxic and they lead to cancer because of the alkaloids that are in them...so it becomes an educational challenge. It's hard after six hundred years of usage.

Gwen Sassafras has been outlawed, not legal to be sold for human consumption by the FDA. There are books coming out that still list sassafras.

Register Just like any other blessing, it's mixed.

Gwen You need to be careful what books you take stock in. Many of the books do not list botanical names. Even places that sell dry herbs do not list botanical names and the same common name can apply to four, five or more plants.

Madalene Also the fact that in medicinal herbs, the root or the bark or the leaves or the seeds have different properties at different times in their development. After they mature, there's a change in the structure of the root, so they don't develop some things until they're dried...or the time of year. People are so gullible. They'll buy anything.

Gwen ...and desperate in some cases. A lot of people couldn't care less. They're just after the money...and there's a lot of money involved.

Register There is something very powerful about the very simple experience of watching something go from a seed to a plant. I interpret that experience as being a communion between living things. For me, it's a part of what I call worship in my life. How do you see it?

Madalene It's a miracle! When you plant a seed that has all the nutrition it needs... when the first two little leaves come up, we call them nurse leaves and everything is in those two leaves that permits that plant to establish its roots and its stem and begin growing. All in that tiny, tiny seed. Sometimes they're so minuscule you can hardly see them and yet it's all there. It's incredible.

Register What is the emotional experience?

Madalene We do it so much, we don't think about it. We just planted a bunch of seeds, and it was such an incredible experience for the people who had never planted a seed.

It gets back to your beliefs. Man alone couldn't have done this so how did this happen? You look at all the other things on the face of the earth and how they have evolved, so philosophically, it's an incredible thing to think about..how the trees get us our oxygen...without which we wouldn't last long on this earth.

Gwen It gives children a perspective on life that I feel is very important, one that I feel they don't get any other way. It takes away the emphasis on things, particularly monetary things. Children...are smart enough to see, from this seed...what you get. It's also amazing to see what they don't know about...where food comes from.

Madalene People so often tell me, all through the years, that they did not know what was missing in their lives until they bought a couple of herb plants and grew them and all of a sudden they saw this is what I've been missing. They were searching for something, and they didn't know what it was.

Register Why do you think that is? That happens to lots of people. Why?

Madalene I think the fragrance has a lot to do with it. I think it triggers something. We have a genetic memory, you know. Plants and animals have it, and I know that we have it too. This is how people recognize fragrances in different parts of the world.

It may not be the same plant that grows over here but the oils are the same and the fragrance is the same and they know it's safe to use. Maybe they've never seen that plant until they came upon it but still genetically, in their memory, they recognize it.

Gwen With herbs, the thing that catches the fancy of so many people is the fact that they have all these uses. There are so many facets. It gets over into art and music. They are part of needlework, textiles and other things.

Madalene Then another whole world opens up when people realize that plants around them, that were just flowers and plants and trees, have a herbal use in other parts of the world. In the Herb Society, we say that any plant that is considered useful to man, is considered a herb. It's almost the entire spectrum of plants...something like 255,000 or so.

Gwen We are very generous in our definition. We say when in doubt, call it a herb.

Register There was a fad back in the 'Seventies when the book The Secret Life of Plants came out. People said that there was some sort of sensorium going on in there. The plant was experiencing things in its environment?

Madalene They talk to you in many ways... certainly when they wilt. They move to the sun and move to the light.

Register So your sense of it is that they are living things in the same sense that you and I think of each other as alive.

Madalene Yes. They have needs.

Gwen Even though we've never done any type of experimenting, I know that there have been studies using music and I know...

Register ...in your heart?

Gwen ...yes, that it's true and I know in my heart of hearts that they'll do better listening to Bach than to...

Register Than to Guns and Roses?

Gwen Yes, yes (laughter). Number one, if I was there I would have ripped them up if Guns and Roses was playing and my hair, too (more laughter).

Madalene There are a large group of people who look but they don't see. They don't see the things that plants will tell them; when they need to be trained, when they need to be pruned, when they need water or more light. They have a language all their own. It's very obvious. It isn't hard to learn.

Register What originally drew you to the study of herbs and plants?

Madalene I can remember the first time I paid any attention to plants. I was about three years old. I played with little black children, played in the cotton fields and this black woman would bring us a midmorning snack...big old pieces of bread, slathered with lard and sugar. We'd sit on a little bridge and eat this bread and sugar and run through the cotton plants. There were taller than I, at three years of age. I thought they were the most wonderful plants in the world.

When we went to Kansas, we went to a little German community to live. Everyone had a garden. They always grew a few herbs that went into the food, the sage that went into the sausage and into the teas. Chives were always grown. I was fortunate because these were first generation German and Dutch and they didn't have common names for plants. They used botanical names for plants. They didn't call it sage, they called it salvia officinalis. I remember we kids thought that was great. We used some of those names in skip roping. Got it into a song. I have always been interested in plants.

Gwen I came to it from a different angle. I came from the kitchen and kind of backed in. I grew up with other interests...in the arts (Gwen is a violinist).

Register In what ways has your character changed as a result of your gardening?

Gwen It's an humbling experience because you are dealing with things that are, to a great degree, out of your control because you are dealing with Mother Nature. It can bring you down a peg or two.

Register There's some real value in knowing that you don't control your own universe.

Madalene It's very humbling to know that no matter how much you know about plants, you'll never know all there is to know. In botany or biology, either one, you just simply cannot know everything. Every day is a new experience. It's a wasted day if you don't learn something new.

Register What metaphors for living does gardening offer?

Madalene If more parents became gardeners, really grew things, the lessons they learned from training plants or not training them. If they applied those same things to their children.

Register What in this work gives you the greatest joy ?

Madalene To share a plant. I've always shared everything that we brought back from any place in the world. I've always sent them out to growers. I wanted to see how they would grow in other parts of the country.

They've come back to me after the tornado (the Hilltop Herb Farm was destroyed by a tornado), many things that I couldn't have gotten again. And with food, to teach people in a very simple way to appreciate a different thing that they haven't been exposed to...that food is not just for the stomach but also the soul.

Gwen I just like dealing with food. The whole atmosphere of Festival Hill just feeds, as they say, the soul..., and my love of music goes hand in hand. The people and staff are so encouraging. It's such a wonderful and unusual endeavor that it makes it very interesting being a part of it. I'm interested in doing whatever I can to support the whole project. I feel like it's a privilege.

Register What are the challenges of herbal cooking?

Gwen Trying to get people to stop thinking of it as "herbal cooking." That it's just good food.

Register What dishes are your current favorite dishes.

Madalene What she's having today (laughter).

Gwen We've been doing a lot with roasting sweet potatoes with rosemary and mixing them with other vegetables. Sweet potatoes are so surprising.

Madalene The first cortisone came from sweet potatoes. They have a lot of benefit for people.

A few days later, I returned to find Madalene tending plants in the new Cloister garden at Festival Hill, nursing little miracles from the soil of a magical garden fashioned after the meditative space of a monastery. Somehow, it seemed appropriate.