Plant · P-583

Marjoram

Origanum majorana

Sweet Marjoram is the milder, sweeter relative of oregano, grown for a leaf best used fresh and added late in cooking - it flavours dressings, vegetables, legumes and oils, and its steam-distilled oil goes into perfumery, soap and hair products. It is a true perennial only where winters stay mild; nearly everywhere else it is grown as an annual or dug up and brought indoors before frost, since cold rather than heat is what actually kills it. Left to bloom, its small white or pink flowers work bees and draw other beneficial insects, though that flowering is the same event that ends the best culinary harvest. It is a distinct species from both common oregano and the pot marjoram sold as Turkish oregano, even though the three names get traded loosely at the nursery.