Herb Salt
Herb Salt
Herb salt. Once you make it, you won’t want to live without it. I love fresh herbs but there comes a point in fall when you either eat them all or let them die. Well not anymore, making herb salt it a wonderful way to preserve your herbs. I have pureed herbs such as parsley and basil and frozen them in oil or water, but I’ll be honest, I forget about those little frozen cubes of goodness in the back of my freezer. If you have enough herbs, I recommend you preserve them in multiple forms, freezer cubs, oils, salt… But if I could only make one, it would be herb salt. The recipe is easy and it is really more of a technique. Once you have the dried or dehydrated salt, you can add it to veggies when roasting them, soups, stock, eggs, sprinkle on buttered toast or use to season meats. There are so may combinations. I’ll give you a basic recipe. You will need a food processor for this.
Ingredients:
at least a handful or large bunch of:
parsley
rosemary
thyme
sage
oregano
basil
2-4 garlic cloves
lemon zest from 1 lemon
1 lbs salt (corse or fine)
generous pinch of red pepper flake (optional)
Recipe:
Rip the leaves of the harder herbs such as thyme, sage, or rosemary off their stems and give them a rinse and a spin the salad spinner if you have one. For the more tender herbs such as parsley and even basil, just wash and dry and use the whole herb, stem and all in the salt. Then add them to the food processor.
Add lemon zest, garlic, pepper flake
Add 1 lb salt and process until it looks like bright green sand.
Spread onto a baking sheet and dehydrate in 200 F oven for 1 hour or let sit out overnight
The final product with be a dry to the touch and like a dull green sand. Sometimes it is hard or clumpy. That is not a problem.
Break the salt apart with your hands or a spoon and then scoop into jars for storage.
Keeps ‘forever’ but won’t last that long. A great gift for friends or family as well.
