Mrs Burns' Lemon

'Mrs. Burns' Lemon' is the yardstick other lemon basils get measured against, and unlike most of them it is a true Ocimum basilicum (var. citriodora) rather than an O. × africanum hybrid — a tetraploid with 2n = 4x = 48. Its provenance runs through southeastern New Mexico, though sources tell it slightly differently: Wikipedia credits Janet Burns of Carlsbad with introducing it in 1939 from seed given by a neighbour who had grown it since the 1920s, Fedco names a Mrs. Clifton as the grower who passed seed to Mrs. Burns, and Native Seeds/SEARCH records it as maintained since the 1950s by the mother of co-founder Barney Burns. All three agree on the region. Native Seeds/SEARCH put it into commercial circulation in 1983 and it has been a catalog fixture since. The reason is the scent: the strongest lemon of any lemon basil, driven by high citral, with cinnamon, mint and floral undertones from linalool.