BURLINGTON, Wash. (AP) -- Just behind the Sakuma Brothers Farms Market Stand, in a 5-acre field bordered by a strawberry patch, a decade-long project to bring locally grown tea to market has finally come to fruition.Earlier this summer, workers walked through the tightly packed rows of nondescript evergreen plants, named Camellia sinensis, and one-by-one they pinched off the plants leaves near the stem.Later, the leaves were heated, rolled and dried in the sun, with the resulting brittle flakes ready to be steeped in water and served as tea.Last month, after the Sakumas first sale of loose-leaf green and white teas, the family-owned farm became just the second commercial tea plantation in the continental United States, and the first on the West Coast.

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Get well

Do you have fresh garlic somewhere in your kitchen? How about carrots, onions and fresh ginger? Mustard? Maybe you've got a little Italian seasoning on hand?

Great.

You're nearly ready to battle the upcoming cold and flu season with a mix of surprising home remedies that are easier to throw together than you might imagine.

Forget over-the-counter punch packs of gels and tablets.

If you're a gardener, you may also already have medicinal herbs in your yard, including lavender, sage, rosemary and thyme, not to mention mint, yarrow, echinacea and chamomile.

Such simple ingredients are at the heart of "Kitchen Medicine for Colds and Flu," a continuing education class now in its third year at Bastyr University with naturopathic physician Nancy Welliver.