Nothing transforms food as much as herbs. They bring depths of flavour to other ingredients. As we move away from rich, salty recipes, they are used increasingly to enhance the taste of food. And as well as tasting wonderful, they smell and look enticing and bring colour and texture to the plate. So when you use these gods of the kitchen, you cook with all your senses.
Supermarket sales of herbs are increasing, but the range available is small, they are expensive and, even when chemicals are used to prolong shelf life, they soon go stale and yellow. By growing your own herbs, in pots or in the garden, you can make any recipe without worrying what’s in stock in your local shop. You can pick your herbs just before cooking, using precisely the amount you need, knowing this freshness brings the optimum flavour.
The frustration cooks can feel when they can’t buy the herbs they need for a recipe was shown when a man I had never seen in my life turned up unannounced on my doorstep one morning, emerging from a car full of children and suitcases. He was on the way to Cornwall and had ordered some lobsters to be delivered to him there for a special recipe that needed chervil. But he could not find it anywhere. Finally, a local greengrocer, who knew my passion for herbs, pointed him in my direction. To reward his persistent enthusiasm I gave him a huge bag of chervil as a holiday present, just as I give away cut herbs and plants to friends, neighbours and to chefs when we eat out locally in pubs and restaurants where they really care about good food.
Many of my favourite herbs are hard to find in shops, but are easy to grow in the garden. Herbs like chervil, lovage, sorrel and oregano are rarely stocked, but they thrive year after year in my herb garden and are used in dozens of my best recipes, like Guinea Fowl with Lovage and Lime (see page 52) or Sorrel Ice Cream (see page 111).
The memorable flavour of herbs like these has helped to change the culinary code that insisted certain herbs always went with particular ingredients – for example, rosemary or mint with lamb and parsley with fish. Now people experiment. As my recipes show, I use rosemary with orchard fruits, like pears, and lamb with lavender. Mint is as likely to be used in desserts as meat dishes and parsley at its best is made into pesto or fresh sauces.
Herbs build up layers of flavour, with “hard” herbs like bay, thyme and rosemary used for long cooking, infusing a dish with their characteristic, earthy tastes. “Soft” herbs like basil, coriander/cilantro, parsley or chervil are added at the end of cooking, almost like a seasoning. They can be scattered over a dish, mixed into a sauce, or added to lightly dressed salad leaves. Many of them, like chervil, have elegant leaves which look perfect as a decoration. When I am chopping these soft herbs, I do it at the last minute so the juices do not dry up and the herbs do not lose their impact on our taste buds. I use a very sharp knife to avoid bruising, so the juices are retained inside the herb leaves, achieving taste, aroma and beauty all on one plate.
When we sit down to a meal, my guests sometimes find a vase of freshly picked herbs in the middle of the table, which they often nibble and always talk about. I explain how other parts of the world have been more loyal to herbs – something we in the West are just waking up to.
I tell them about the custom in the Middle East of having a bowl of herbs served with mezze, which is still done today. Women believe eating them makes them healthy and remember the old tradition that these herbs keep their men away from rivals.
Sorrel and chervil have always been sold on French market stalls and the same can be said of oregano and basil in Italy and coriander/cilantro in Asia. It seems clear to me that when it comes to herbs, the rest of the world has a lot of catching up to do.
