Chef Tips for Keeping Herbs, Day 16 Self-Love Detox Challenge

               

Bonjour!

We all know the frustration of losing expensive and needed for recipes herbs. Well, we Chef's have a way of keeping them fresh for as long as possible. Every professional kitchen stores their herbs in a metal food bin with water in the fridge. This works well but in those kitchens there is high turnover of food because they are used daily in recipes. It's rare that ingredients like fresh herbs go bad for want if use. But what about the home cook? How can we keep them lasting as long as possible with minimal fuss? Well, today I am showing you an easy method and it will come in very handy for your rawfood/juicing ingredient's that you are tired of throwing out, because they have expired too quickly. So, how do we go from wilted and useless:

                           

To this beautiful happy, healthy, ready-to-use a week later loveliness? Let me tell you.

              

Herbs are different and respond to specific methods of preservation in ways that will surprise a novice.its important to respect what the plants are telling you with non-verbal cues. What are you talking about Kiki? Well, if you take a moment to look at your herbs you will see that some have variegated leaves, these are the one's that really need water to stay looking plump and fresh. It's the same concept as with wilted lettuce, sprinkle some cold water on wilted lettuce leaves and wait 5 minutes, they will spring back to life! If you look at herbs and flowers like thyme and lavender, these don't do as well immersed in water. Their small tight leaves have a tendency to give way to rot when sitting in water. These are better used ASAP, dried, or placed in olive oil and frozen to preserve for later use. Today we are focusing on mint and Italian parsley.

             

Just purchased and out the bags (keep the bags), I pick them over, remove & discard any rotten or going leaves, then rinse well in cold water. This works for most herbs with the exception of dill & sage, these end up looking like drowned rats and are made more difficult to handle when wet. 

              

Mason jars or re-purposed clean old glass jars are perfect for this exercise. Fill them halfway with cold water, go over your herbs and make sure nothing yellowing or rotten remains; as these can speed up decay in healthy remaining herbs. Slimy stuff is not good either and needs to be rinsed & removed.

          

Grab your cleaned and rinsed herb bunch, one herb at a time, and place it with the elastic still on in the water; just like the picture above.

           

This is where that plastic bag it came in, comes in handy. Make sure there is nothing rotten or sandy in it by shaking it out, gently place over the herbs and bring the bottom of the bag towards you. Gently twist the end of the plastic bag to form a tight twist. Fold this while wrapping the plastic bag so that it holds snug to the jar.

          

Grab a pair of scissors and CAREFULLY cut little holes around both sides of the bag, around 6. This was an old trick a gentleman in the produce department at a health food store I worked at taught me. He explained that because these were living plants, they require air and some water to live as long as possible once harvested. Brilliant! And it works. Store these in the fridge on the door or nearer to the front where freezing will be less likely, as some fridges are very cold in the back & this can be damaging to delicate herbs.

         

This method can be used for herbs like mint, parsley, coriander and I even use it for my scallion aka green spring onions-just remove yellowing stalks as needed. Every 2-3 days I change the water and inspect them for yuckie bits that need to be removed. These next pics are of the herbs a week later:

         

Parsley

                        

Mint

I hope this helps, leave any questions or comments below and don't forget to subscribe. Have a blessed day!