We are asked to start new threads, so here goes. I use a lot of fresh thyme, basil and coriander. I keep meaning to try a wider range of fresh herbs in my cooking and its partly habit and partly availability which stops me. Which fresh herbs do you use the most and why?
I tend to use a lot of thyme as well. Its a heb which keeps very well and if it gets dried out a bit I just hang it up and let it dry out completely. Lately though I've been experimenting with dill. Its not use that often in the UK but wow it packs a punch!
Ken Natton
Über Member
Now this is a great topic. I confess to being quite inexpert at this – it is all about understanding which ones work in which circumstance. And just like a great singer or a great violinist has to have a very acute ear, so the key to this is all about having a good palette.
So sage is a great one. It is very strong, the smell that comes off it when you chop it is great. My wife started growing some in our back garden and for a while it seemed like it as going to take over. For a while it was great to be able to go out into the back garden and pick a handful of sage leaves to put into something I was making that day. Anyway, sage in meatballs or in stuffing is just wonderful.
Yeah, I like thyme too – it seems to almost give a slightly spicy background to sauces you use it in. The trouble with it, of course, is that it is so fiddly. I like it when you are making a stew or something like that where you can put a few whole stalks in, and then just lift the bare stalks out at the end.
Mint, of course. If I’m making a chicken curry it has to have lots of mint and lots of coriander. And at the end lime juice. I got all of that from James Martin.
What else. Rosemary I don’t use as much – not that I don’t like it I’ve just not made a lot of recipes where it seems to feature. It was in that Salcice sauce recipe that I have made a couple of times and I definitely did get the sense of it in that dish.
Oregano is a strange one. You don’t seem to be able to get it at the supermarkets so I did buy an oregano plant and for a while it did okay in our back garden. But it is also very fiddly and I have never had much of a sense of what it adds when you use it fresh. You almost seem to be better using the dried stuff. Don’t know what people think about that.
But of course, still, the herb I use most is parsley. As I have said elsewhere, I’m never convinced about the flavour it adds, it seems to me to be more about the look. Sauté potatoes sprinkled with chopped parsley just somehow look good. And of course, aeoli, the taste is all about the garlic and the olive oil, but it just looks so much nicer with chopped parsley in. That sweet and sour chicken dish of Nigel Slater’s that I mentioned elsewhere includes a garnish made with chopped green olives, chopped preserved lemon skins and parsley. There the flavour of the parsley is more apparent, but the whole thing is that you chop it coarsely, if at all. Anyway, I loved the chicken dish itself when I made it but that garnish was just gorgeous. Can’t tell you how effective it is.
I really hope this conversation develops. I think herbs are a big key to making the dishes you make that much better. I am really interested in how other people use them.
So sage is a great one. It is very strong, the smell that comes off it when you chop it is great. My wife started growing some in our back garden and for a while it seemed like it as going to take over. For a while it was great to be able to go out into the back garden and pick a handful of sage leaves to put into something I was making that day. Anyway, sage in meatballs or in stuffing is just wonderful.
Yeah, I like thyme too – it seems to almost give a slightly spicy background to sauces you use it in. The trouble with it, of course, is that it is so fiddly. I like it when you are making a stew or something like that where you can put a few whole stalks in, and then just lift the bare stalks out at the end.
Mint, of course. If I’m making a chicken curry it has to have lots of mint and lots of coriander. And at the end lime juice. I got all of that from James Martin.
What else. Rosemary I don’t use as much – not that I don’t like it I’ve just not made a lot of recipes where it seems to feature. It was in that Salcice sauce recipe that I have made a couple of times and I definitely did get the sense of it in that dish.
Oregano is a strange one. You don’t seem to be able to get it at the supermarkets so I did buy an oregano plant and for a while it did okay in our back garden. But it is also very fiddly and I have never had much of a sense of what it adds when you use it fresh. You almost seem to be better using the dried stuff. Don’t know what people think about that.
But of course, still, the herb I use most is parsley. As I have said elsewhere, I’m never convinced about the flavour it adds, it seems to me to be more about the look. Sauté potatoes sprinkled with chopped parsley just somehow look good. And of course, aeoli, the taste is all about the garlic and the olive oil, but it just looks so much nicer with chopped parsley in. That sweet and sour chicken dish of Nigel Slater’s that I mentioned elsewhere includes a garnish made with chopped green olives, chopped preserved lemon skins and parsley. There the flavour of the parsley is more apparent, but the whole thing is that you chop it coarsely, if at all. Anyway, I loved the chicken dish itself when I made it but that garnish was just gorgeous. Can’t tell you how effective it is.
I really hope this conversation develops. I think herbs are a big key to making the dishes you make that much better. I am really interested in how other people use them.
Ken Natton
Über Member
No, I didn't know that. Is it coincidence that they have the same name or is there some connection between them?
Question is, do you use them in your cooking, and if so, how?
We don't get the Mexican one here (except on-line and dried) so I don't know how it tastes. I'm sure it could be grown in the garden - lemon verbena grows here and is delicious.
They are completely different. Mexican oregano has a citrus note and the Mediterranean has an Italian flavor.
I do use both, but depending on what I am cooking. I wouldn't use Mexican oregano in an Italian dish.
I miss my old herb garden. I used to have either perennial or self re-rseeding areas of parsley, regular and lemon thyme, rosemary, sage, regular and garlic chives, chervil, cilantro, mint, wild garlic, horseradish (would that be considered an herb?), sweet and Thai badil, and oregano. It was great to just walk outside and snip pretty much whatever herb I needed for that night's dinner.
I can no longer grow a garden until I am able to put in a big enough fence to keep the deer, turkeys, bears, groundhogs, anf other critters out.
I can no longer grow a garden until I am able to put in a big enough fence to keep the deer, turkeys, bears, groundhogs, anf other critters out.
I miss my old herb garden. I used to have either perennial or self re-rseeding areas of parsley, regular and lemon thyme, rosemary, sage, regular and garlic chives, chervil, cilantro, mint, wild garlic, horseradish (would that be considered an herb?), sweet and Thai badil, and oregano. It was great to just walk outside and snip pretty much whatever herb I needed for that night's dinner.
I can no longer grow a garden until I am able to put in a big enough fence to keep the deer, turkeys, bears, groundhogs, anf other critters out.
Blimey! Sounds like you live in the sticks. No bears around here in Maidstone. Or the rest of the animals mentioned. Herbs can be easily grown in pots or window boxes. Do bears eat herbs? Do you really get bears?
MypinchofItaly
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I used basil a lot, in the simple tomato sauce, on pizza or to prepare pesto homemade for pasta. I also used a lot of sage to fill chicken rolls, cooking beans, and sometimes when it leftover, I prepare a fast batter and then I fry them. Sometimes sage is great to use of I have gingive pain.
LadyBelle
Veteran
Basil, parsley, mint are my most used.
Coriander is the herb of the devil.
Coriander is the herb of the devil.