"Bill who putters" wrote in message
...

I have only one that is outside in a large pot right now. That s a
Kiffer Lime which flowers when I have been real good (Kidding).
I love lemon grass but I'm at a loss to find other gems.
Any thing I should consider ?

--
Bill S. Jersey USA zone 5 shade garden
globalvoicesonline.org
http://www.davidmccandless.com/


Lemongrass, and C. hystrix I've grown and are practically a staple when it
comes to Thai cuisine. If you can successfully overwinter Citrus, you will
have more options. But even on the "borderline," the very common & lowly
calamondin orange is easy, and is highly decorative (-ok well maybe only if
you grow them as beautifully as my g'mother did!), and its fruits will
oftentimes substitute for a wedge or two of lemon juice. And Key lime fruits
may be small (at least mine were, grown in containers) but, even their skins
*IMO* are really very palatable; more so than kumquat.
And there's rosemary, but I never seemed to have the knack for the stuff -
always croaked on me after a couple years. Nice looking plant if you can
grow it on. Makes a nice pale lavendar dye if you don't like the taste :-)
I could probably think of a bunch of other stuff but few would really be
considered "decorative" as houseplants.
One exception comes to mind is banana, whereas growing indoors will almost
surely never produce fruit but might possibly be used in Thai cooking. I
truly like these as houseplants, but they can be a little fussy as to their
soil, since over a few years they IME tend to get rot.