Sage advice on herbs
E A
ATING in is the new eating out if we’re to believe what we see on television. But instead of reaching for a stock cube or a pot of condiments when you’re home cooking, turn to the garden.
You just can’t beat home-grown herbs. Besides giving food flavour they come with a mixture of vitamins and biochemical magic.
But which to grow? Any of the well-known culinary herbs – parsley, chives, rosemary, thyme – are handy to have growing close to the back door and are all easily cultivated in a sunny, well-drained bed of soil or tub of potting compost. Exotic herbs that we never knew what to do with a few years ago have also shot up in popularity.
Basil and coriander are great “optional extras” that need warmth so they’re best grown in pots indoors on a warm windowsill in winter or a container on the patio in summer.
Once you are familiar with the mainstream culinary herbs, it’s worth branching out a bit and discovering a few long-forgotten “old faithfuls”.
Lovage is a multi-purpose herb which belongs to the cow parsley family and looks like angelica, a perennial plant with large jagged leaves and thick, 5ft tall stems topped with large flat heads of pale yellow fennel-like flowers.
The stems were traditionally cut into 1in lengths and put into casseroles and stews for a strong meaty flavour. Lovage was known as the vegetable Oxo cube for this reason although the “bits” need fishing out before food is served.
Fresh lovage leaves are also useful as a flavouring, in much the same way as chopped parsley, for soups such as leek and potato or in stuffing for chicken. The dried seeds can be crushed and sprinkled on to salads, homemade bread or mashed potato.
Lovage grows readily in any moisture-retentive soil in sun or light shade, or a large tub. When you cut a developing flower stem to use for the pot, more of them will shoot up from the base so one plant is enough.
Leaf celery (also known as cutting celery) is treated as a cut-and-come-again crop. It has the same flavour as proper celery but it’s very much quicker and easier to grow.
You can have it all year round if you sow it thickly in pots on a windowsill and snip the seedlings like mustard and cress. Otherwise sow it in tubs or windowboxes or put a row in a salad bed. Use leaves and stems for stews or salads. ND for anyone with a sweet tooth, add sweet cicely to your list. It’s another cow parsley relative with ferny foliage and bold cow parsley flowers. The young foliage stewed with tart-tasting fruit such as apples, plums or blackcurrants adds a hint of summer and reduces the need for sugar which is good if you’re counting calories.
So if you plan on spending more time dining in, put a bit of time in your herb patch. It’s the best culinary investment you can make after a good set of kitchen knives.
THANKFUL FOR SMALL BLESSINGS