I cook a lot of Japanese & Korean food, and this plant - yomogi in Japanese, ssuk in Korean - is a joy. It's a wonderful plant, and I was delighted that Pennard had these in stock last year. I ordered in late summer / early autumn, and while the leaves are normally harvested in the spring when young & tender, I knew it'd be going dormant soon and so pruned it pretty heavily, including new growth, after potting up. The feathery, silvery leaves are similar to wormwood or aster (its relatives) and very pretty indeed. They start out soft and slightly fuzzy, and this is when you want to harvest them. You can technically dry them straight after picking, but they can be more bitter than is pleasant. Instead, I was taught to briefly blanch them before drying. Bring a pot of water to boil, plunge in your leaves for 10 seconds if young or around 30 seconds if tougher & older, then move into a bowl of ice or ice-cold water to stop the cooking process. Once blanched, dry them thoroughly with a clean dish towel. (The blanching water smells great and makes a lovely facial steam, if that's your thing, or can be added to your bath water for a gentle herbal bath. Lush.) Thus blanched, the leaves are ready to use. The taste is very unique, strongly herbal but very gentle. It's hard to explain it, but once you've had it, you'll agree it just tastes like springtime! You can mix these into pajeon (Korean savoury pancake) batter and fry - super delicious - or you can treat them like nettles and sauté in a bit of butter with garlic & chopped onion, add in chicken or veg broth, some peeled & cubed potatoes, simmer for 20min, season & add a splash of cream if you like, then puree into a delicious green soup. I normally dry the leaves in dish towel as well as possible, then spread them in a single layer on mesh in a well-ventilated part of my kitchen, out of direct sun, to dry fully (takes a week or so depending on the weather). If you have a dehydrator, use that of course. The fully dried leaves can be used as an herbal tea (particularly nice mixed with some lemon verbena) but I use a spice grinder to grind them into a fine powder - they're quite fibrous, so 'fine' is a relative term, but I don't bother sifting it - and use them to make mochi & dango. I also recently used them in a batch of Hawai'ian butter mochi (somewhere between a cake & traditional mochi) and that combo of yomogi and butter is just on another level. In the garden, this plant can theoretically get invasive (though with its root system should likely be easy enough to manage, unlike something like mint) so I would recommend growing it in a large container, at least until you get familiar with it. The leaves provide some great structural interest & silvery colour, and the plant is sturdy even when we get our coastal gales tearing through here. It does die back completely in the winter, so please don't take that as a sign it's gone - come spring, you'll soon see early signs of growth again. It's extremely hardy and has coped well with extremes of both heat & cold here, on a rather exposed patio. Thank you Pennard for stocking plants that are less-known in the West!