{"id":20252,"date":"2025-08-24T13:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-24T13:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/20252\/"},"modified":"2025-08-24T13:19:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-24T13:19:08","slug":"inside-berlins-monk-garden-that-grows-edible-and-medicinal-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/20252\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Berlin\u2019s \u2018Monk\u2019 garden that grows edible and medicinal plants"},"content":{"rendered":"

By&nbspRoselyne Min<\/a>&nbspwith&nbspAP<\/b><\/p>\n

\n Published on
\n 23\/08\/2025 – 8:01 GMT+2\n <\/p>\n

\"\"
\n ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n

While most of us think parsley, basil, and rosemary are as far as herbs go, this massive plant nursery near Berlin wants to show people the forgotten traditions in the era of mass-produced food.<\/p>\n

Nestled in Marienfelde, a suburb in southwest Berlin, the Monk Garden houses nearly 200 types of rare herbs, leaves and trees.<\/p>\n

From numerous varieties of mint, oregano and cilantro to New Zealand spinach and Syrian black cumin, plants housed here would have been familiar to monks in monasteries, but today, many of them are rarely found at a regular supermarket in Germany.<\/p>\n

Martin R\u00f6tzel, the owner of the Monk Garden, fears that much of this knowledge has fallen by the wayside, particularly as food production has become ever more industrialised and hopes his garden can increase people’s understanding of plants.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt some point, the knowledge was lost,\u201d said R\u00f6tzel.<\/p>\n

\u201c[These days,] something like 99 per cent\u00a0 of people don’t know a single name of a plant,” he added.<\/p>\n

He organises long table dinners prepared by a fine dining chef, workshops and seminars where people can try and learn about edible and medicinal plants.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are trying to provide access to this ancient knowledge through formats such as this one, Reficio (the dining experience), because basically you can explain a lot to people, but if they don’t try it, if they don’t taste it and if they don’t know how to prepare it in a delicious way, they won’t pursue it anyway,” R\u00f6tzel said.<\/p>\n

Curious visitors<\/strong><\/p>\n

As a kid, he was always interested in plants and herbs. When he fell ill 13 years ago, he deepened his knowledge of herbs and made teas that he said helped him regain his health.<\/p>\n

He started collecting rare plants and propagating them in an allocated garden. Now, he owns the 2,000 square metre ancient garden and a medicinal monastic garden next to a church in the German capital, reflecting those grown in the Middle Ages to provide plants for food and healing.<\/p>\n

Both mirror the green sanctuaries once cultivated by monks to feed and heal their communities.<\/p>\n

Curious visitors come to learn more about the plants here.<\/p>\n

They can also learn to be \u201ca little more adventurous when it comes to preparing food, in terms of products, not always relying on pepper, salt, and paprika, but also using something green and fresh, and maybe I’ll plant something in the garden,\u201d said Britta Rosenthal, a guest at the Monk Garden.<\/p>\n

Another guest, Angela Merscher-Harms, said the visit had already given her food for thought.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am a nurse, so I naturally find it very interesting and exciting to learn what can be healed and achieved with nature as opposed to medicine,\u201d said Merscher-Harms, a guest at the Monk Garden.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am also lucky that my husband is a gifted amateur chef. And of course, I hope that he will pick up a few tips and tricks here to cook even more delicious things for me\u201d.<\/p>\n

For more on this story, watch the video in the media player above.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Video editor \u2022 Roselyne Min<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By&nbspRoselyne Min&nbspwith&nbspAP Published on 23\/08\/2025 – 8:01 GMT+2 ADVERTISEMENT While most of us think parsley, basil, and rosemary…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20253,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[274],"tags":[2567,18,518,135,19,17,462,3618,13194,10348],"class_list":{"0":"post-20252","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-agriculture","9":"tag-eire","10":"tag-food","11":"tag-health","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-medication","15":"tag-nature","16":"tag-processed-foods","17":"tag-tea"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20252\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}