The fruits of my fiance's labour

So over Christmas Michael built me a herb garden on our balcony. Originally I wanted this massive over-engineered vertical construction - in the end, he convinced me that shelves and pots would be fine :)

He's so talented - I'm so lucky :)

It turned out so pretty!! I love the little black pots and all our gorgeous herbs. I love to cook as you know, and I had previously been quite frustrated at the inconvenience and cost of buying herbs at the supermarket on a per use kind of basis. Firstly, the amount you can get is always way too much for one recipe (and yeah, throw that basil in a glass of water in the fridge, make it last - $10 says you still don't use it again  and throw it out all wilted and nasty in a week's time). Secondly, it's so expensive for what you're actually using, $3 for a handful of sage? As if!

Sidebar: look at me being all indignant and frugal :)

By far the most amazing thing about having your very own herb garden on your balcony is that you can dash out spontaneously to the balcony in the mornings and pick just enough fresh gorgeous basil to make a delicious salad like so:

And you can pick heavenly fresh mint for your morning green smoothie - but more on those later :) xo