Alvaaka

Native Seeds/SEARCH accession HB013, held in their seed bank as a Yaqui (Yoeme) basil. The collection note is unusually specific: a small seed sample came from a Yaqui woman at New Pascua, the Pascua Yaqui community outside Tucson, who brewed the leaves into a tea she considered good for the stomach and as a general tonic. The accession is recorded from the low desert at about 2,500 feet elevation. What growers notice first is the smell, unusually strong for a basil, described as floral by some and frankly licorice by others, and it is that aroma rather than any pesto credential that has kept the line in circulation among Southwest gardeners. Seed goes out in roughly 0.2 g packets of about 50 seeds, capped at three packets per order, which is a fair indication of how limited the stock is.