Muscadines & Miracle Tree Tea

My Tropical Tree Plant Experiment

Yesterday, I spoke to Momma’s Garden Club and had lunch with them. Deviled eggs and a ‘salad’ with tiny marshmallows and canned orange slices were my favorite things. I met with the chimney repair crew, dug some crinum with Tom and Cole, weeded within intern Lily, and chainsawed up some fallen pecan limbs.

I needed an energy drink.

My topic for the Garden Club talk was muscadines and scuperongs—our native grapes. I started with muscadine history. You know, a story gets people to pay attention. You see, in 1580, when Sir Walter Raleigh set up the Roanoke Colony, the one that later got lost, he’d touted Virginia as a magical land where grapes fell out of the trees.

Granted, that’s not what folks want a speaker to start with as feels a bit like 7th-grade history class. That kind of history can put folks to sleep. But I was working my way ‘round to a very important point.

To make it more palatable, I offered every lady a muscadine sangria. I didn’t bring much because I figured some of these would be proper, abstaining Baptist ladies. But no. Not one of them turned down wine — at 11 a.m. You’d have thought this was the picnic at an Episcopal church in July.

All that is to tell you that I don’t have much of an essay today. I need an introvert day to rejuvenate and build my energy. I’m having an energy drink- Miracle Tree tea.

Here’s a picture of my miracle tree. I first grew this in Haiti. In the tropics, it grows into a tree about the size of dogwood.

Later, I saw it growing in Charleston (USDA 9) as a cut-back shrub.

A few years ago, I grew out 80 seeds and planted them here in Beech Island, which is USDA 8b - a zone colder than Charleston. Most died the first winter. But one made it through two winters; it even survived the 2022 Christmas cold.

Could this be my cold hardy miracle tree? Could this one day be part of September’s bountiful crops? Muscadines and Miracles?

Miracle tree leaves are full of micronutrients. You can use them raw, cooked, or dried. They also make an elegant addition to the summer garden.

If you know folks who get into health foods they can easily grow at home, please share this with them. Mirical tree is easy from seed.