Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
Hooked on herbs
Former TV presenter Judith Hann on the passion that grew into a whole new career
As the presenter of the BBC show Tomorrow’s World for 20 years, Judith Hann was used to making predictions about whether new technological developments would catch on. Many innovations featured – including compact discs, breathalysers, cash machines and pocket calculators – did prove winners; others, such as paper underwear, floating bicycles and foldup cars, were wide of the mark. But did Judith ever foresee that, after leaving the show, she would become one of the nation’s leading experts on culinary herbs?
‘Ab s olut e ly not!’ she laughs. ‘ In those days I only had a small London garden, and while I loved visiting gardens like Sissinghurst and Hidcote I really didn’t do much actual gardening.’ She was far more interested in food, and as a scientist (she has a degree in zoology) she was keenly aware of the link between food and health.
Her lightbulb moment came in the mid-1980s when she presented an eight- part BBC series called The Taste Of Health, about how to cook food that was both healthy and appetising. ‘ Making the programme meant spending a lot of time with famous chefs and eating their food,’ Judith says. ‘During that time I tried lots of herbs I’d never tasted before and it was a revelation to realise that nothing transforms food like herbs. That inspired me to start growing my own herbs in a small way.’
A few years later she and her husband John Exelby, a former BBC news executive, bought a small farm in the Cotswolds. The property included a derelict pig yard – it was a sheltered, walled area with poor but free-draining soil, making it perfect for Mediterranean herbs such as thyme, rosemary, sage and marjoram. It also had shady patches suitable for growing sorrel, angelica, tarragon and lemon balm. Judith threw herself into researching herbs and visiting herb gardens with such fervour that her husband eventually pleaded with her: ‘It’s time to stop reading and start digging.’
Judith planted the walls of her garden with figs, grapes, roses and cher- ries, and created a central pond to attract frogs, which would eat the slugs that prey on herbs. In the beds she planted 150 different types of herbs, and many of those original perennial plants, including sage, rosemary, chives, sorrel and lovage, are still thriving in the garden 20 years later, needing just the occasional trim. In mid-spring and then again in late summer she sows annual herbs such as chervil, purslane, dill and coriander.
Judith, 76, and her husband still run a media training company, but herbs are her real passion. Summer holidays have become a thing of the past – her garden is much too interesting to leave at that time of year. She has become such an expert that she was president of the Herb Society for two years; she also teaches courses about how to grow and cook with herbs and last year she wrote a book about them.
For Judith, herbs are the ultimate convenience food. ‘They take up less space than vegetables, and all you do is cut what you need – the plant will go on growing. And it’s not just flavour they add to your food; using herbs helps you cut down on salt, and by cooking puddings with sweet cicely and angelica you can add sweetness without using sugar.’
Most of us use very few fresh herbs, she points out, and are unaware of the range and variety of what we could grow. ‘ Go to a French or Italian or Middle Eastern market and you’ll see masses of different herbs for sale, but we British are nervous about using them. I would hate to be without lovage and sorrel yet they are almost impossible to find in supermarkets – so the answer is to buy them from a good garden centre and grow them yourself. And if you have the space, grow chervil as well – it’s another herb you’re unlikely to find in the shops.’
If you have a small garden, Judith recommends growing your herbs in among flowering plants or shrubs. Fennel, lovage and angelica look striking at the back of a border, while rosemary and bay can be carefully pruned to give shape to your beds. Hyssop and marjoram will give you colour in late summer – and the bees love them.
Although Judith’s garden is at its peak in mid-summer, she uses herbs all year. This autumn she’s growing salad herbs such as mizuna, tangy mustards ‘ Red Frills’ and ‘Golden Streaks’, and cresses ‘Bubbles’ and ‘Wrinkled Crinkled’. It’s not too late to sow these now under glass if you have cloches, a cold frame or a greenhouse. In winter she’ll be picking leaves like salad burnet and broad-leaved sorrel and making syrups from her scented-leaf pelargoniums or delicious oils infused with herbs.
While on holiday in Thailand some years ago the hotel chef asked her – after learning about her herb expertise – if she’d help him redesign the hotel’s herb garden. She agreed, and so her relaxing break turned into a working holiday. Wasn’t she annoyed to be torn away from the poolside? ‘I enjoyed it actually,’ she admits. ‘If you ever wanted proof, there it is – herbs have taken over my life.’