Mint

Don’t plant mint in the ground

Mint is aggressively invasive — its underground rhizomes spread relentlessly, choking out neighboring plants. Garden experts uniformly recommend planting mint only in containers, preferably buried containers that contain its spread.

People who plant mint loose in a garden bed often regret it within two seasons. The rhizomes can travel 5+ meters and pop up wherever there’s open soil.

Spearmint vs peppermint

The two main culinary mints have different flavor profiles:

• Spearmint (Mentha spicata) — milder, sweeter; standard for chewing gum, mojitos, lamb sauce, many savory dishes
• Peppermint (Mentha × piperita) — stronger, more menthol; used in candy canes, peppermint tea, ice cream

Peppermint is actually a hybrid of spearmint × water mint, which is why it has the menthol kick that spearmint lacks.

Cool sensation

Mint’s signature cooling sensation comes from menthol, which activates TRPM8 cold receptors on the tongue. The compound triggers the same nerve pathway that responds to actual cold — your brain reads “cold” even when the leaf is at room temperature.

This is why eating mint and breathing through your mouth produces an exaggerated cold feeling — incoming air hits already-activated cold receptors. The same mechanism makes menthol useful in cough drops, where it provides a sensation of clearing the airways even when nothing physical is changing.