Sweet Garden Broth Recipe

Nutrient-dense sipping broths, like this spring garden broth, stoke digestive fire and prime the system to intake food. It's especially beneficial for postpartum healing at the start of the day and before meals throughout the postpartum period. For a quicker, easier version, simply cook an apple in spring water with ghee, clove, cardamon and peppercorn until the fruit is translucent. Eat the soft fruit and sip its cooking water as a tea. 

• 1 tablespoon fresh cultured ghee
• 2 teaspoons fresh ginger, peeled and grated on a microplane
• 1 crisp+sweet pink apple, peeled and cored
• 3 sweet carrots, peeled (my favorite organic carrot variety is the Scarlet Nantes, a french heirloom - find seeds to grow your own from High Mowing Seeds or Seeds Savers Exchange)
• 1 small fennel bulb, sliced. Reserve fennel fronds for garnish.
• 3 whole cloves
• 3 whole green cardamom pods, crushed slightly to open at one end
• 2 teaspoons natural mineral salt
• 1 teaspoon whole peppercorn
• 2 teaspoons whole coriander seed
• Spring water

For Garnish:

• Sweet lime wedges
• Tulsi (Holy basil)  - grow this in the garden or in a small pot on the windowsill

Heat ghee over medium heat until melted, then add the grated ginger and softly saute until fragrant, about 1 minute. Keep an eye on the heat level so that the ginger doesn’t burn. Add apple, carrots, fennel, clove, cardamom, salt, peppercorn, and coriander seed. Cover the vegetables with spring water up to one inch above the level of the vegetables. Bring to a gentle boil, then cover the pot, lower the heat and simmer for 2 hours, until the broth is concentrated and flavorful. Strain, then portion into a sipping bowl, garnish with chopped fennel frond and serve hot with a squeeze of sweet lime and fine ribbons of tulsi.

Cottage Inside is a Doula Practice in Los Angeles. It is the dream and prayer of Morgan Lynn, a Zen student and certified Birth and Postpartum Doula trained in the Ayurvedic tradition. An avid home cook, Morgan grows much of the food for her kitchen in her Runyon Canyon garden, following the principles of the Biodynamic French Intensive Method. Cottage Inside offers cooking, self care practices, and transitional support programs for the year of conception and beyond.