Herbs For Health And Cookery

For when you secretly want to be a witch, but with a casserole dish.

Herbs For Health And Cookery (1977) by Claire Loewenfeld and Philippa Back is the book that gently takes you by the hand and says: “Yes, you can put leaves in things and pretend it’s medicine.” Published by Pan Books, this is that perfect late-70s fusion of sensible kitchen advice and quietly mystical plant enthusiasm, wrapped in a mass-market paperback that probably once lived next to a jar of dried marjoram and a very determined yoghurt maker.

Loewenfeld and Back treat herbs as a full lifestyle: you don’t just sprinkle parsley, you commit to parsley. They explain how to grow, harvest, dry and store your little green miracles, then show you what to do with them—whether that’s flavouring soup, soothing a cold, or making a tisane that tastes faintly of hedge but is “excellent for the digestion”. The tone is brisk and practical, but you can tell they’re secretly delighted that the same plant can both liven up potatoes and allegedly mend your liver.

Inside you’ll find:

• Cheerful profiles of all the usual suspects—thyme, sage, rosemary, mint—plus the slightly more ambitious “I own a trug now” herbs.

• Recipes that feel charmingly pre-celebrity-chef: herb butters, soups, stews, syrups, and earnest salads that assume you are unfazed by raw onion.

• Home-remedy suggestions for minor ailments, from “nervous tension” (1970s code for “had it up to here”) to sluggish digestion, all treated with herb teas and common sense rather than pharmaceuticals and panic.

• Enough gentle plant lore that you start looking at your window box as both kitchen and apothecary.

This Pan Books edition, ISBN: 0330253360, is in Condition: Good, according to the carefully jaded standards of Crappy Old Books, which usually means:

• The cover is intact with some light creasing—like a basil leaf that’s been through one recipe too many but still smells amazing.

• The spine shows a few reading lines from previous herbal crusades (January health kicks, allotment phases, “I’m going to stop buying ready-made sauces” eras).

• All pages present and firmly attached; no missing instructions on how much sage is too much sage.

• Mild tanning to the paper which, if you’re feeling poetic, you may interpret as “sun-kissed” rather than “this is from 1977”.

You may also encounter:

• The occasional pencilled note from a previous owner who clearly had Opinions about chives.

• A pressed leaf or two acting as a long-forgotten bookmark-slash-experiment.

• Stains that probably came from something wholesome like soup, not from dangerous modern things like energy drinks.

Perfect for:

• Cooks who suspect that salt and pepper are only the beginning of something leafy and glorious.

• Gardeners who want to justify their herb patch as a “health resource” rather than “I like nice smells”.

• Vintage cookbook hoarders with a soft spot for earnest, pre-internet plant wisdom.

• Anyone who likes the idea of self-care but would rather brew thyme tea than download an app.

So here it is: Herbs For Health And Cookery (1977), Condition: Good, as sold by Crappy Old Books—a slightly worn, quietly confident reminder that your kitchen window could, with very little encouragement, become a tiny herbal republic where dinner and home remedy share the same leaves.

Keep browsing: See more Food books Other books by Claire Loewenfeld and Philippa Back