Rosemary is one of the most abundant wild herbs in the Mediterranean and is used in Italy all the year round.
As it has such a dominant flavour, rosemary is used very often to flavour winter tomato sauces when there is no basil. The fresh leaves are picked from the stalks and then chopped; they need to be used quickly as they are very oily and will soon go black.
We also use rosemary with anchovies. It is the primary flavour in the anchovy and rosemary sauce which has been on the River Cafe menu since we first started. We use branches of rosemary as skewers for spiedini of scallops. Rosemary is also pounded with sea salt and stuffed into every cut and crevice of porchetta – a whole roasted pig.