English Peas, Spring Onions and Roasted Almonds

Just cooked English peas, sautéd spring onions and roasted, salted almonds are a delicious combination of tender sweet, sweet pungent, and crunchy just salty. You can set this side dish next to grilled fish or chicken or mashed potatoes and a roast. It's...

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Herbs, Spices & Condiments Category Archive

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Growing Mint

Use mint fresh or dried to flavor vegetables—cabbage, carrots, cucumbers, eggplants, peas, potatoes, tomatoes, and zucchini. You can add fresh mint to cold and hot soups and beverages.

There are all types of mint to choose from: spearmint, peppermint, pineapple mint, orange bergamot, and apple mint to name a few. Mint has a striking aroma, a sweet warm flavor, and a cool aftertaste.

Growing your own mint is not difficult. You can sow mint in the garden or in a small container to sit in the kitchen window. If a neighbor or friend has mint, anytime after the last spring frost is a good time to take a stem cutting or division and get it started. From seed, mint is ready to use in about eight weeks.

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Savory

Trying to cut back on salt and pepper? Try savory.

There are two varieties of the herb savory to choose from: summer savory—a fast growing annual plant, and winter savory—a shrubby perennial.

Both savories have a bit of a peppery bite. Summer savory has a flavor reminiscent of thyme, mint, and marjoram. It is more subtle than winter savory. Winter savory is more pungent with a flavor of sage and pine.

Chopped finely, summer savory can be added to cheese dishes, egg dishes, fish soups, and summer vegetables. Add it lightly—just one or two leaves--until you are familiar with its strength. Summer savory is good for those on a salt-free diet.

Winter savory—which can be harvested and used after summer savory has died back—will provide fresh leaves into early winter. Use winter savory to complement salads, especially bean, lentil, and potato salads, dried bean dishes, and stuffings. (The German word for savory is Bohnenkraut, which means “bean herb.”)

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Tarragon

Use French tarragon fresh whole or ground with fish and shellfish, chicken, eggs, salad greens, or tomatoes.

French tarragon has a spicy anise flavor with a basil note and a sweet aftertaste. Its leaves hint of pine and licorice.

The flavor of French tarragon diffuses quickly in dishes so it is best used sparingly. Add finely chopped tarragon to soups and cooked vegetables such a beans, beets, cabbage, cauliflower, and broccoli.

Tarragon is the principal flavoring in béarnaise sauce and white and brown sauces for chicken and veal and can be added to butters, vinegars, and marinades.

Tarragon butter is simple to make; it can be frozen and is an easy way to add tarragon to many cooked dishes. Here’s how: For each 2 tablespoons of softened butter, add 1 teaspoon of finely chopped tarragon, 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice, and salt to taste.

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Mint Tisane

Tisane is a tea like drink made by steeping a single herb or a mixture of several herbs in boiling water. Flowers and spices can be added.

Tisane is the French term for a restorative herbal tea.

Popular tisanes include chamomile, scented geranium, linden, jasmine, lemon verbena, hibiscus, and rose hip.

The peppermint you use for seasoning can be stirred into boiling water and served as an herb tea or tisane.

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Mint Varieties

Spearmint, peppermint, pineapple mint, orange bergamot, and apple mint: these are just a few of the mints used in cooking.

The peak season for fresh mints is summer, but many mints will grow indoors year-round in a bright window. And dried mint leaves can be used when fresh mint is not available.

Mints can be used to garnish salads or beverages. Mints complement both fresh summer vegetables and winter root vegetables. Use mints to flavor soups and dried bean dishes.

There are about two dozen varieties of mint—almost all from the genus Menthe--commonly used in cooking and food preparation. Here are a few you might want to try:

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Mint

Mint can be used both in sweet and savory dishes.

Add mint to new potatoes or to a garlic and cream cheese dip. Mix mint with chocolate cakes or bake with raisins and currants in pastry.

Mints are an excellent addition to sauces, syrups, vinegars, and teas.

There are more than 2,000 varieties of mint—about two dozen are commonly used in cookery. All offer clean, sharp flavors that can be both cooling and warming.

Two mints most used in the kitchen are spearmint and peppermint.

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Chilies

Chilies or hot peppers can be eaten raw, baked, fried, grilled, or stuffed. They are used as a vegetable fresh and as a spice dried.

Chilies, like sweet peppers, are not only aromatic—like celery and onion—but contain natural chemicals that enhance the flavor of other foods during cooking.

Generally, small, hot chilies—such as the jalapeño, Serrano, poblano, Anaheim, and banana--are used fresh. They are often chopped and then simmered or stir-fried with other foods. The longer a chili is cooked, the hotter the flavor.

Large hot peppers more often are dried and then used whole, ground, or crushed for blending with other foods. Dry-roasted chilies are the most intensely flavored. Several varieties of dried and ground chilies combined will add a complexity of flavors to prepared foods.

Peppers boost the tastes of other ingredients. Fresh chilies combine well with fresh tomato-based sauces, onions, avocadoes, beans and lentils, mild cheeses, sausages, meat stews and sautés, corn, poultry, fish, and shellfish. Dried chiles are added to curry powder, chili powder, cayenne, and pizza pepper.

The skin of a chili has its own distinctive flavor and that flavor varies from one variety to the next. To begin to learn more about which chilies you like best, start with the skins. The seeds and ribs of a pepper should be removed to isolate the flavor of the chili skin.

Chilies, like sweet peppers, are widely available fresh during the summer and fall months.

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Cilantro and Coriander

Cilantro or coriander?

Yes! And no, that wasn’t a trick question.

The cilantro plant and the coriander plant are the same plant.

And in most parts of the world, coriander is simply known as coriander. However, in the United States coriander refers to the seeds of the coriander plant, and cilantro refers to the herb leaves of the coriander plant.

Why the difference?

Well, it basically comes down to differentiating an herb from a spice in the kitchen. Just to review the basics: an herb used in cookery usually comes from the leafy part of a plant, and a spice usually comes from the bark, buds, fruit, roots, seeds, or stems of a plant.

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Sweet Basil

Basil with tomato, basil with garlic, basil with onion, basil with olives.

The sweet, clovelike aroma and warm and peppery yet minty flavor of basil can liven up mixed green salads, vegetables and vegetable soups, pasta and pizza, eggs dishes and eggplant salad, fish and seafood, veal, lamb, pork, and chicken.

Basil—which is native to India--is a key herb in the Mediterranean regional cooking of France and Italy and is important to Thai, Vietnamese, and Laotian cookery as well.

There are more than 60 varieties of basil in various shades of green, reddish, and purple. Sweet basil—also called Genoese basil, with large, bright green, silky leaves--is most often used for cooking in the western world.

Sweet basil—like other basils—is available from the garden in summer; hothouse basil can be found year-round. Hothouse basil can be tenderer than garden grown basil but less aromatic.

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Dill

Partnering dill with fish and seafood got its start a few thousand years ago in the Nordic countries of northern Europe.

Dill—which has a flavor somewhere between celery and parsley with the peppery undertones of anise and the feint aroma of lemon—brings lingering warmth to cured and marinated salmon and herring as well as fried and boiled fish.

Partnering dill with potatoes, root vegetables, cabbage, cauliflower, and as a flavoring for pickled vegetables, cucumbers, and gherkins also got its start in northern Europe, in Poland and Russia.

Why? Maybe it’s because just picked dill leaves have a refreshing quality that is comforting and dried dill seeds bring warmth to foods preserved for serving in cold winters.

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