Our 2025 EFN seed catalogue is now live! Featuring over 130 new varieties and over 640 total varieties, sourced from over 50 different growers from across the country. Huge thanks to all of our growers, volunteers, and to our stellar seed-house team in Minnesota! Each of you make this work possible.

Marshmallow

Marshmallow

$3.75 Sale

Althaea officinalis

Origin: Maine

Improvement status: Wild

Seeds per packet: ~100

Germination tested 11/2024: 64%

Life cycle: Perennial

Marshmallow is a classic medicinal herb of Eurasia, naturalized now in much of the Midwest and Northeast. This large perennial mallow is probably best known for being a ingredient in the precursor to the modern sugar/gelatin blobs known as marshmallows. It has a long history is herbal medicine, used as a source of mucilage to soothe sore throats and other inflammation and irritation in the GI tract. Flowers and young leaves are also eaten, and root extracts can be mixed with sesame seeds or sunflower seeds and sugar to make the Middle Eastern dessert-snack called halva.

GROWING TIPS: Seed germinates better after 30 days of cold/moist stratification.