IN WHAT WAYS CAN FRESH HERBS BE USED, AND WHAT IS THE BEST SELECTION TO GROW?

The traditional uses of herbs in cooking, and in toilet and medicinal preparations, would fill a much larger book than this one.

By all means, always serve your oily fish with fennel and your pizza with fresh oregano, but be inventive as well. Some of the culinary masterpieces of French and Continental cuisine came about because the cook was out of mushrooms and used truffles instead; or the mint was dormant for the winter, so the lamb had to be flavoured with rosemary. Try some new combinations.-

All the culinary herbs are quite beneficial in the quantities generally used to make herb teas or to garnish or flavour food, so let your imagination blossom, and try some hot herb slaw (page 143) or herbal variations on an omelette, and take it from there.

Remember to use only a small quantity of the fresh herb to flavour a dish. One sprig of sweet basil with two or three leaves on a stem 2 inches long will be enough to flavour a whole salad bowl; or chop one or two leaves and sprinkle over fresh tomatoes. One of our family favourites is onions and tomatoes cooked quickly together in a little butter, served on wholemeal toast with several chopped leaves of basil sprinkled over the top before serving, or a little sprig of marjoram or oregano added to the hot butter for several seconds before adding the vegetables.

Herb oils and vinegars can be made quite easily at home. Both make excellent gifts and can dress up an everyday meal to make it a “speciality of the house”.

Buy a good white wine vinegar. This is essential, as inferior quality will not give the herb flavours a chance. Then find some leftover bottles in decorative shapes, preferably with a screwtop (corks tend to take up the herb flavour). Pick a handful of your favourite savoury herb at its best, bruise it well with the mortar and pestle, and add to each handful about a pint of the vinegar, then bottle and seal well. Leave for one week, then strain. Repeat the process with another handful of the fresh herb if a stronger flavour is required. After the second week, strain to remove all leaves and stems, and return to the bottle, sealing well. Then use the vinegar in salad dressings to give that magic j’e ne sais quoi that will keep your guests guessing. Tarragon, savory, basil, marjoram and sage are a few suitable herbs. ‘

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TARRAGON: GENERAL RECOMMENDATION

Tarragon can easily be dried. Pick the long woody stems at the height of their late summer or autumn growth, tear off the trailing side branches and dry these; or slice off the top, soft growth with shears, and spread it out on racks. Strip the leaves from the stems when brittle and crackly, and store as usual.

A delightful herb vinegar can be made by steeping a large handful of the soft tops in wine vinegar for a week. Remove the herb, and if a stronger flavour is required, repeat with new leaves for another week.

The mature bush may die right back in winter in cold or frosty areas. Cut off the top growth, and cover the roots with a mulch of straw or peat moss for the winter, and the new root suckers will break through in the spring. These can be divided from the parent with a sharp spade or trowel, and replanted elsewhere. Indeed, it is advisable to keep new plants coming on each season, for the flavour is fresher and more concentrated in the new growth.

For the table, some of these following recipes should give you new ways to use this herbal aristocrat. Never use tarragon in soups or dishes needing a long boiling time: it becomes quite bitter and unpalatable.

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HERBS: MINT

Various types LABIATAE

All the Mint family need water and more water, but never, never let their roots lie in soggy, badly drained ground. Mint will grow almost anywhere provided these two necessities are available—water and good drainage.

In warm climates mint will grow in partial shade or full sun (although too much shade will cause it to grow tall and spindly), and indeed will grow so vigorously that it is advisable to confine it in some way: in a walled bed, raised above the ground; in a large terra-cotta pot (12 or 14 inches will do); or, if you want it in the open garden, try sinking an 18-inch length of terra-cotta drainpipe upright in the garden, and plant your mint in this. If on the other hand, you have a large garden, and do not mind odd stalks of mint among the hydrangeas and gladioli, by all means plant your mint and let it wander. I grow all my mints both ways, my stock plants confined to large tubs and odd plants here and there in my garden. When I am weeding, the sudden sweet fragrance of applemint or sharp spearmint tells me my mints are on the move again.

All the mint varieties will inter-pollinate, and sorting out the species can be a headache. Try to grow them away from each other if you are a purist, for their flavours will eventually become adulterated if cross-pollination occurs. Alternatively, nip off all flowering stems as they appear—sometimes a tedious job, but well worth it to preserve the flavour.

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DANDELION BEER

So use Nature’s free materials wherever you find them. Dandelions will grow under the most deprived, difficult conditions, in crannies along public footpaths, on railway embankments, on wasteland, even at rubbish dumps; but wherever they grow, they are still of great medicinal value to man. I have precious clumps growing at the side of my gravel driveway. The more I pick the leaves to use in salads and juice drinks, the more vigorously they grow. In midsummer I make up batches of Dandelion Beer, from an old Scottish recipe. Half the quantity can be tried first, as one pound weight of dandelions is quite a large amount to obtain at once. This recipe below makes nine or ten 30-ounce bottles.

Dandelion Beer

Pull up one pound weight of leaves and tap roots (not rootlets), wash well, add rind and juice of two lemons, then add two gallons of water. Boil for 1\4 hour. Strain the liquid over 2 lb. raw sugar, add 2 oz. cream of tartar, and half an envelope of lager yeast. (The original recipe called for fresh yeast, 3\4 of a cake, but the packaged yeast seems to make a better brew.) Let the liquid stand in stainless steel or porcelain bowls for three days, covering lightly. Never use aluminium vessels for making herb beers. Bottle in brown or dark green bottles, cork well, and it will be ready to drink in one week; but it will be even better if you leave it for two.

The beer is slightly bitter, more to be sipped than quaffed in one swallow, but most refreshing on a hot summer’s day. You can feel it doing you good.

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HERBS DESCRIPTION: BORAGE

Borago officinalis BORAGINACEAE

The “Herb of Gladness”, borage was a favourite of the ancient writers and scholars. The leaves, and sometimes the flowers, too, were steeped in wine and drunk as a general tonic, and an uplift for mind and spirit. It is believed to be the Nepenthe of Homer, used to dispel sorrow when mixed with wine, and it has perhaps a similar use today in Pimm’s No. 1 Cup, which it flavours.

Pliny christened it “Euphrosium”, and wrote that it made men merry and glad. It also gained the reputation of giving courage as well as joy, and became a flower symbol for courage. The brilliant blue starry blooms were embroidered on scarves by the womenfolk and these were presented to warriors before battle. In the age of chivalry in England, a cup of borage tea was often drunk by competitors before tournaments and jousts.

Borage is an easy annual to grow, and can be sown right through the year in warm frost-free areas; but if you live in a district that gets frosts it is best to sow in spring, with another planting in early summer. When scorched by frosts, the plant degenerates to black, brittle untidiness, and this may have been its state when Gerard described it as having “leaves of a black or swarte green colour”.

The biggish, bomb-shaped seeds should be sown covered by 1\4 inch of soil in the garden or s inch in seed boxes. They sprout readily, with almost 100 per cent germination, and should be through the soil in 3 to 8 days. The seeds will also self-sow very readily, so if you start with one plant, although it is an annual, you will soon have many small seedlings about your garden. Put borage in full sunshine, keep it well-watered in the early stages, but do not feed it too heavily or you will get huge clumps with many leaves but no flowers. Underfeeding, if anything, is better. The hairy greyish-green leaves can sting with their sharp little needles when you pick them, so handle with gloves and care. Washing under cold water for several minutes before use makes them more tractable. Borage leaves are not recommended for drying at all for the home gardener.

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