Fresh herbs - how to use

ubamother

I'm a big fan of freezing herbs, esp ones like parsley and mint which I think lose most of their flavour through drying. I just freeze in bags - when frozen it crumbles very easily and can go straight into sauces etc.

I haven't tried it, but I would guess rosemary would dry more successfully, as 'tougher' like bay leaves. Rosemary oil is nice.

At a pinch, I suppose you could make a huge pan of herb stock and freeze in icecubes to add to sauces and soups.

Oooh, wouldn't get rid of much, but individual mint leaves frozen into ice cubes make lovely additions to summer drinks.

floss2

Let your rosemary grow - it is naturally a shrub. When the stems are about 9 - 12 inches long, cut them, remove the leaves & use as BBQ skewers - great for lamb or monkfish!

Herbaholic

Hi Norman, not sure if you know you can eat the flowers of many herbs as well, forgive if you do? I made the recipe below for a talk I gave on herbs and it got devoured, it's a regular in our house during the flowering season. You can use rosemary flowers as well. I love watching the faces of people I give rosemary flowers to and ask them to eat them, most don't realise that they can be eaten or that they taste of rosemary

Chive & Thyme Flower Savory

125g Cottage Cheese
125g Cream Cheese
I Tbsp Chive Flowers
1 Tbsp Thyme Flowers
1 Tsp Olive Oil
Freshly Ground Black Pepper
Crackers to serve

Place the cottage cheese and cream cheese into a bowl with a teaspoon of olive oil and beat with a fork. Add the chive and thyme flowers and stir, season with black pepper and place into ramekin dishes; oil the dishes first if you wish to turn the savories out onto a serving plate.

Chill well, and when chilled turn out on to a serving plate on a bed of salad burnet leaves and long pieces of chives. Decorate with whole chive flowers and salad burnet flowers. Serve with herb crackers or melba toasts.

---

You can make herb vinegars for giving as presents, or why not add some lemony herbs and lavender if you have them and make homemade pot pourri? You can make lavender biscuits with dried lavender and rosemary shortbread is lovely, I scatter fine chopped rosemary on sweet potatos and wedges of red onion to go with chicken instead of roast spuds or mash. Herb vinegars are good for the adding to the mop bucket and the rinse water instead of fabric softener. I made a Green Clean gift hamper last year for a friend with a couple of different herb vinegras, some soapnuts and some homemade lavender beeswax polish and some homemade handcream for after the housework, I threw in some dusters and stuff and my friend loved it. Not everyone would like cleaning stuff for xmas but if you know someone who would then its a great herby and personal gift.

You can freeze herbs in ice cube trays and then you'll never be without herbs for adding to soups and stews. Ohhh almost forgot if you dry and press the herbs you can decorate candles with them, or make some gift cards to go with the herby gifts and decorate them with the pressed herbs. Last year I wrote on large bay leaves with a silver pen when I'd run out of gift tags and made some aromatic gift tags.

You could make homemade mint jelly with the mint and give that as gifts, or you can dry different herbs and make herb tea blends taylored to suit the people you're giving gifts to. Rosemary is very uplifting and mint is great for indigestion for example, loads of recipes and ideas out there, I'm a big fan of chocolate mint tea from my garden, love the stuff and you can't buy it in the shops. Hope the above suggestions are useful.

Herby x

midnightraven3

confused about the pesto too as its definately pine nuts & basil (and lots of it)
Jamie Os recipe is very nice for it too

i freeze excess herbs, as well as dry them
when i freeze them i get small round shallow tubs, but any will do
i pack with washed herbs, fill with water and freeze, i then put them in a bag
they are like hockey pucks then, when i need one for soup etc, i just drop one in
some herbs freeze better that way, coriander & flat leaf parsley spring to mind or you just get crumbly leaves, this way they retain their shape

Penelope_Penguin

midnightraven3 wrote: »

confused about the pesto too as its definately pine nuts & basil (and lots of it)

Fair enough; as I said, the classic pesto is basil and pine nuts, but when I last looked there was no law preventing me from making "pesto" with my own blend of HG herbs, walnuts, rape seed oil and Cheddar

I have done this, and it's delicious :T My HG herbs cost nothing, so it's :money: too

floss2

Penelope_Penguin wrote: »

Fair enough; as I said, the classic pesto is basil and pine nuts, but when I last looked there was no law preventing me from making "pesto" with my own blend of HG herbs, walnuts, rape seed oil and Cheddar

I have done this, and it's delicious :T My HG herbs cost nothing, so it's :money: too

I agree - traditionally pesto was made with basil, olive oil, pine nuts and parmesan, but even Sacla now make jars of rocket pesto

We usually make it with YS or HG herbs, whatever nuts and whatever oil are in the cupboard and whatever hard cheese is in the fridge (peccorino, manchego, parmesan).

Norman_Bean

Thanks gang - especially Herby that sounds yummy but not sure if I'll be able to find cottage cheese - will have a look tomorrow.

Well the sorrell soup was gorgeous but the kids hated it ... so only partial success but at least it used up lots of sorrell.

Think I might try the tea idea x

thanks again all x

zippychick

Hi NB

Found a whole ream of threads with heaps of ideas for you :j:D Really love the idea of giving them as "mixed herb" gifts

What to do with rosemary

What to do with mint

What to do with dried mint

Freezing and preserving herbs should be helpful

Also

Using parsley and parsley sauce, freezing and making

Ideas for cooking sorrel

lemon thyme

Sage tea advice?

I'll merge this later with the thread Penny linked to

Hope this helps
Zip

Norman_Bean

Thanks Zippy

I Will check out those links later this evening once I get the ratbags to bed :eek: am interested about the lemon thyme
thanks again
E x

diluvsdiscounts

I often use mint leaves to make an ice bucket if we are having a bbq with friends,very impressive to keep the wine cool!