Parsley
TASTING NOTES
Parsley has a lightly spicy aroma with hints of anise and lemon; its taste is tangy and herbaceous, and has a light, peppery note. Flat-leaf parsley has a more persistent and finer flavor than curly parsley and a finer texture. Both bring out the flavors of other seasonings.
Petroselinum crispum
Probably the only herb considered indispensable by most Western cooks, parsley is a truly versatile biennial, native to the eastern Mediterranean region. Today it is cultivated throughout most of the temperate world. Parsley root, which is valued for its root rather than its leaves, was first grown in Germany in the 16th century.
PARTS USED
Fresh leaves are the most used, but stems are good for flavoring stocks; parsley root is grown for its roots.
Culinary uses
Parsley is liked for its clean, fresh taste and is rich in iron and vitamins A and C. It is used in sauces, salads, stuffings, and omelettes in many parts of the world. In Anglo-Saxon cultures its use as a flavoring ingredient (except in a parsley sauce) rather than simply as a garnish is quite recent. Add chopped parsley at the end of cooking time for a fresh flavor. Sprigs of dark green, deepfried curly parsley make an excellent garnish for fried fish. Parsley root is used in soups and stews, but it can also be blanched and then roasted or cooked in other ways as a root vegetable. It mashes well with potatoes.
BUYING / STORING
Buy a pot of parsley for your windowsill; or buy a bunch, wrap it in plastic, and store it in the refrigerator. Discard any sprigs that look slimy and it should keep for 45 days. Parsley can be chopped and frozen in small containers or in ice cube trays with a little water. Don’t buy dried parsley.
GROW YOUR OWN
Parsley seeds take some weeks to germinate, but soaking them overnight in hot water helps speed up the process. Sow in the ground, and thin seedlings when they are big enough. Sow seeds every year, so that when one batch goes to seed in its second year a new batch is ready to use. Harvest from late spring.
Curly parsley
Good for garnishes, curly parsley also gives a light, herbaceous flavor and an attractive green color to mayonnaise and other sauces.
Flat-leaf parsley
Also called French or Italian parsley, flat-leaf parsley has the best flavor for cooking, and is most widely used throughout Europe and the Middle East.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Essential to a number of traditional flavoring mixtures: French bouquets garnis, fines herbes, and persillade; Italian gremolata and salsa verde; Lebanese tabbouleh. Good with eggs, fish, lemon, lentils, rice, tomatoes, most vegetables. Combines well with basil, bay, capers, chervil, chile, chives, garlic, lemon balm, marjoram, mint, oregano, pepper, rosemary, sorrel, sumac, tarragon.
Stems
Parsley stems are coarser in flavor than the leaves. Tie them in a bundle and use in long-cooked stocks and stews; discard the stems when cooking is completed.
Parsley root
Mostly cultivated in central and northern Europe, parsley root, also called Hamburg parsley, is no more difficult to grow than leaf parsley. It looks like a small parsnip or, if round, a turnip. Its flavor combines those of parsley and celery, with a light nuttiness. The leaves have a coarse flavor and texture.
Purslane
TASTING NOTES
Purslane has little aroma; the fleshy leaves and stems have a refreshing, lightly piquant, astringent, lemony taste, and a crunchy, juicy texture.
Purslane
Portulaca oleracea
Purslane is a sprawling annual that grows wild throughout much of the world. It has been used as a food plant for centuries in southern Europe and the Middle East. An important source of iron and vitamin C, purslane is also one of the best plant sources of Omega-3, one of the fatty acids that help to maintain a healthy heart.
PARTS USED
Leaves and young shoots. The flowers can be added to salads. Purslane is always eaten fresh.
BUYING / STORING
Fresh purslane will keep for 23 days in a plastic bag in the vegetable crisper of the refrigerator. In summer Greek and Turkish markets usually have large bunches of purslane. In Mexico, you find it readily in markets.
Culinary uses
Young leaves make an agreeable addition to a salad. In the Middle East, chopped purslane with a garlicky yogurt dressing is served as an accompaniment to grilled meats. The herb is also a standard ingredient of fattoush, the Lebanese salad. Blanch older leaves to use as a vegetable. Cooking emphasizes their mucilaginous content, which provides a good thickening for soups and stews. In Turkey, large bunches of purslane are used in a traditional lamb and bean stew, and all around the Mediterranean it turns up in soups. The Mexicans cook it with pork, tomatillos, and chile peppers, especially smoky chipotles Purslane combines well with spinach tossed in olive oil and lemon juice.
GROW YOUR OWN
Purslane does best on moist, light soil in a sunny position. Seeds can be sown outdoors from early summer, and the leaves are ready to harvest around 60 days later. In hot, dry weather it will need more watering than other herbs. Cut purslane a little above the ground, leaving two leaves for regrowth. For salad, harvest young leaves regularly because older leaves become tough. Yellow flowers appear in summer, but only open for a short time around midday.
Fresh sprigs and flowers
Green purslane has oblong, thick, succulent leaves and a round stem tinged with red. Golden purslane (P. sativa) is a smaller plant and is less hardy.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Good with beets, cucumber, eggs, fava beans, feta cheese, new potatoes, spinach, tomatoes, yogurt. Combines well with arugula, borage, chervil, cresses, salad burnet, sorrel.
Miner’s lettuce
Claytonia perfoliata
Miner’s lettuce, also called claytonia and winter purslane, is a delicate-looking annual that makes an excellent winter salad herb. It is called miner’s lettuce because miners in the California Gold Rush ate the wild plant to avoid scurvy–like the unrelated purslane (Portulaca oleracea) (p.20), miner’s lettuce is high in vitamin C.
TASTING NOTES
Miner’s lettuce is not aromatic. It is mild, with a clean, fresh flavor.
PARTS USED
Leaves, young stems, and flowers.
BUYING / STORING
Culinary uses
Leaves, young stems, and flowers make a useful and pretty contribution to the salad bowl. I particularly like miner’s lettuce for its winter usefulness, when other salad greens can be dreary. The leaves and stems can be cooked–try them alone or with other greens, stir-fried with a little oyster sauce.
Miner’s lettuce can be gathered from the wild in shady grasslands in North America, its native habitat, but it is less commonly found in Europe. It is best picked and used at once, but can be kept in a plastic bag in the refrigerator for 12 days.
Fresh sprigs and flowers
Miner’s lettuce leaves totally encircle the smooth stems. The tiny, white flowers are borne on thin stems from early summer.
GROW YOUR OWN
A few herb nurseries now stock miner’s lettuce, but it is also easy to grow from seed. Seeds sown in spring will produce plants for summer use; summer sowing will produce plants for winter picking. Miner’s lettuce does survive near freezing temperatures. It prefers a light soil, but is adaptable. Miner’s lettuce makes a pretty garden edging plant.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Combines well with arugula, chives, sorrel, watercress.
Borage
TASTING NOTES
Borage has a gentle aroma and a somewhat stronger flavor of cucumber. It is cool and fresh-tasting, with a slight saltiness.
Borago officinalis
This robust, annual herb, native to southern Europe and western Asia, is now naturalized throughout Europe and North America. It is worth growing just for its dazzling, blue, starlike flowers. The old herbalists held that borage made people cheerful and courageous; it is now known to stimulate the adrenal glands and have mild sedative and antidepressant effects.
PARTS USED
Leaves and flowers. Avoid the bristly stems.
BUYING / STORING
Borage is best used fresh. Leaves can be kept for a day or two in the vegetable crisper of the refrigerator, either wrapped in a damp paper towel or placed inside a plastic bag. Flowers are best used soon after picking or they will wilt. Freeze them in ice cubes and serve in drinks.
Culinary uses
Borage is essentially a salad herb. Shred the young leaves because their hairy texture is disagreeable if they are left whole. Combine the shredded leaves with cucumber tossed in yogurt or sour cream, and add them to dressings and salsas. Tough older leaves can be sautéed, or cooked in water and treated like spinach. The Italians use borage with spinach or with bread crumbs, egg, and Parmesan cheese to stuff ravioli and cannelloni. The Turks add the leaves to green pea soup. The flowers will impart a delicate cucumber note to salads, and they look wonderful floating on a creamy soup or flavoring a summer punch. They can also be candied to decorate cakes and desserts. Use borage sparingly.
GROW YOUR OWN
Grow borage in well-drained soil in a sunny spot. It is a large, ungainly plant and will self-seed easily. Plant borage only where you intend it to grow because it has a long taproot and does not like to be moved. Harvest young leaves in spring and summer, and pick the flowers as soon as they open.
Fresh leaves and flowers
Of borage species, only B. officinalis is edible. The white-flowered cultivated variety B. o. `Alba’ can be used in the same way as the blue- or purpleflowered varieties.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Good with cucumber, eel and other fatty fish, potato salad, white cheeses, yogurt; Pimm’s and other summer drinks. Combines well with arugula, chervil, cresses, dill, garlic, mint, salad burnet.
Salad burnet
Sanguisorba minor
Salad burnet is a graceful, bushy, perennial plant with sharply toothed, deep-green leaves. Although delicate in appearance, it is actually sturdy, its evergreen leaves often pushing up through a light covering of snow. Native to Europe and western Asia, salad burnet was brought to North America by early European colonists and is now naturalized.
TASTING NOTES
Salad burnet is not aromatic, and has a mild, lightly astringent flavor reminiscent of cucumber with a hint of nuttiness. Old leaves become bitter and are best cooked.
PARTS USED
Leaves and young stems.
BUYING / STORING
Culinary uses
The subtle flavor of the young, feathery leaves is best appreciated by eating them raw. Add them to salads– they are particularly good in fall and winter, when interesting salad leaves can be in short supply. Chop as a garnish for vegetables or egg dishes; combine with tarragon, chives, and chervil for fines herbes. The leaves are good scattered over soups and casseroles, and made into sauces and herb butters. Burnet is often recommended to flavor vinegar, but I have found this disappointing.
Salad burnet will keep for a day or two in a plastic bag in the vegetable crisper of the refrigerator. In some parts of Europe, you can buy bunches of burnet in the market, where they are sold alongside other herbs and salad leaves.
GROW YOUR OWN
Fresh sprigs
The tender, young leaves have the best flavor. The pretty red flowers have no taste.
Easy to grow from seed, salad burnet flourishes in light, welldrained soil in sun or light shade. Remove the flowerheads and cut leaves regularly to encourage new growth. Divide after the second year to maintain tender growth.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Good with cream cheese, cucumber, eggs, fava beans, fish, salad leaves, tomatoes. Combines well with chervil, chives, miner’s lettuce, mint, parsley, rosemary, tarragon.
Perilla
TASTING NOTES
Green perilla is sweetly yet strongly aromatic, with notes of cinnamon, cumin, citrus, and anise basil, and a pleasant warmth on the palate. Red perilla is less aromatic and has a more subdued flavor. It is faintly musty and woody with cilantro, cumin, and cinnamon overtones.
Perilla frutescens
The aromatic leaves of perilla–or shiso, to give the plant its Japanese name–are widely used in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam. More recently they have been discovered by cooks in Australia, the US, and Europe. An annual herb, related to mint and basil, perilla is native to China. The flavor of dried perilla only palely reflects that of the fresh.
PARTS USED
Leaves, flowers, and growing sprouts. Seeds are harvested commercially for their oil.
Culinary uses
In Japan, red perilla is mostly used for coloring and pickling umeboshi (salted and dried “plums”). Green perilla is served with sushi and sashimi–it is said to counteract parasites in raw fish. The leaves are also used in soups and salads and to wrap rice cakes. Coated with batter on one side only, they are deep-fried for tempura. The Vietnamese shred green perilla and add to noodles; they serve meats, shrimp, and fish wrapped in leaves with a dipping sauce. Chopped green perilla gives a wonderful flavor to cooked rice; substitute dried if necessary. In recent years I have become accustomed to growing perilla, and while I mostly use the red in salads and as a garnish, I increasingly extend my use of the green. I add it to slices of lemon or lime in the cavity of fish to be roasted or steamed, to sauces for fish and chicken, and to salsa verde instead of basil. Sometimes I use it instead of basil with tomatoes, or with pasta or noodles. Oil extracted from the seeds is a rich source of Omega-3 fatty acids.
BUYING / STORING
Fresh perilla leaves are sold in Asian markets. They keep for 34 days in a plastic bag in the vegetable crisper of the refrigerator. Growing sprouts are sold by some produce markets and supermarkets. Red leaves are also sold pickled in vacuum packs. Dried perilla is available from Japanese markets.
GROW YOUR OWN
Perilla is not demanding about soil or situation, but does not like to be waterlogged and does not tolerate frost. Well-drained, light soil is best and a sheltered spot in sun or partial shade. Pinch out the tops to produce bushy plants. Perilla self-seeds easily, especially the red variety.
Green perilla P. frutescens
Green perilla has soft, downy leaves with a crinkly edge. They look somewhat like stinging nettle leaves.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Good with beef, chicken, fish, mooli, noodles, rice, tomatoes, zucchini. Combines well with basil, chives, fresh and pickled ginger, lemongrass, mitsuba, parsley, sansho, wasabi.
Mitsuba
Cryptotaenia japonica
Mitsuba is also known as Japanese parsley, Japanese chervil, and trefoil. This cool-climate, elegant perennial grows wild in Japan and is used extensively in Japanese cooking. It is now cultivated in Australia, North America, and Europe, initially to supply Japanese restaurants but increasingly to sell to herb enthusiasts.
TASTING NOTES
Mitsuba has little aroma but a distinctive, mild, restrained, and agreeable taste, showing elements of chervil, angelica, and celery, with something of the astringency of sorrel and a hint of clove.
PARTS USED
Leaves and stems.
Culinary uses
In Japan, mitsuba is used to season soups, simmered dishes (nabemono), and savory custards, in salads, and with fried or vinegared foods. It adds its highly individual, delicate flavor to matsutake no dobinmushi, a dish made only for a few weeks when the much-prized pine mushrooms are in season. The mushrooms are simmered in a broth and the mitsuba is added for a few seconds at the end. Small bundles of stems can be tied in a knot below the leaves and fried for tempura. Mitsuba is often blanched quickly to tenderize the leaves, or added to stir-fried foods at the last moment; overcooking destroys the flavor of the leaves. The sprouted seedlings are good in salads.
BUYING / STORING
You may find mitsuba is available in a Japanese or an Asian market; otherwise, buy a plant from a nursery. Leaves keep for 56 days if wrapped in a damp paper towel or placed in a plastic bag in the vegetable crisper of the refrigerator.
GROW YOUR OWN
Fresh leaves
Mitsuba means “three leaves” in Japanese, from the three leaflets that make up the leaf. The meaning is echoed in the English name trefoil.
Mitsuba is a woodland plant and is easy to grow in light shade. It seeds itself readily. In summer mitsuba bears insignificant white flowers above the leaves. Leaves and slender stems are harvested from spring through to fall or winter. Mitsuba is not long-lived; I have found it necessary to replace mine after 45 years.
FLAVOR PAIRINGS
Good with eggs, fish and seafood, mushrooms, poultry, rice, and as a garnish for most vegetables, especially sweet roots such as carrots and parsnips. Combines well with basil, chives, ginger, lemon balm, lemongrass, marjoram, sesame.