It is in the mint family Lamiaceae. It is a weed that spread easily in shaded areas.

It has kidney shaped leaves along a square stem (a typical stem shape for plants in the same family as mint). It has purple flower early spring around May in zone 5. Bees loves the flower. When searching about creeping Charlie on online, the web brings sites that explain how to control or kill it in your yard. One thing that is overlooked is that, the weed Creeping Charlie is edible. It has some medicinal properties. According to some herbal medicinal belief, a plant shape can guide us through what part of our body benefits from their medicinal properties. In the case of creping Charlie with kidney shape leaves, it could be assumed that using the tea could help kidney.

The leaves are edible cooked or raw. They can be added to soups or salads. They tend to be bitter. The leaves can be used to make teas. They can improve digestion and help our kidney. Some people use it for cough as well. Whenever you consume a wild plant take caution to include just a little in your diet at a time. These plants can be power horse full of nutrients. A little can go long way and they shouldn’t be consumed like annuals vegetables. For instance, I have not purchased lettuce at the grocery store for at least two years now. I decided not to grow them in my garden this year even though I saved my own seeds from two years ago planting. To make salad last spring, summer, and I started already this spring, I would incorporate sorrel and few leaves of weeds (dandelion, Creeping Charlie) I can see available in my garden and that is edible into my salad.

I stopped fighting with weeds my garden. When I see a weed in my garden I don’t know the name, I would harvest a plant and take to our university extension to identify it. I would do my own research on whether it is edible or not. If a weed is edible, I keep it in the garden. I might cut it down when it is on my way or it shading a valuable plant other than that I don’t bother. I also use weeds as mulch in the garden. These edible wild plants grow without any effort of my part. They grow very quickly in spring to provide me fresh vegetable for my cooking while my annuals struggle to sprout.

Creeping Charlie can be dried and used in winter for tea. However, I would not bother doing that for the simple reason that I don’t like to rinse my herbs before hanging them to dry. I cut them clean as my garden is mulched. Creeping Charlie is low on the ground and it would make sense to rinse it before drying. If the herb rest wet too long though, it might mold. I prefer to add it to my salad in spring and froze some for winter cooking.  This spring I harvested a gallon of it rinsed, chopped, and froze for winter use.

 

Because the plant is low on the ground, when harvesting be careful not to include other weeds unwillingly.

This article is for leaning purposes only, use it at your own discretion.