Have You Ever Cooked with Herbs? Try These Herbs for Starters

Cooking with herbs is like the finishing touches to your dinner party.
They make the dish complete. It may seem intimidating at first. There are so many herbs, that you don't know what to use and how to use them. A good way to start is picking a recipe that calls for an herb. The excitement and enjoyment comes when you can create your own special dish once you learn the unique flavor of each herb.

1. Take a clean leaf from the herb plant and chew but don't swallow. Let the leaf meet the tongue and chew. You are looking for the flavor of the herb. Learning the flavor of the herb this way will help you decide what recipe it is used for.

2. The easiest way to start experimenting is to add fresh chopped herbs to something that is bland yet familiar to you, like sour cream, butter, or potatoes. This will allow the herb flavor to stand-alone and helps you know how much of the herb to add.

3. Just start playing; add Oregano to your pizza, or pasta; add Rosemary to your potatoes, Thyme on your roast. You'll want to keep notes of what you liked and disliked, how much you're used. Note whether the herbs were fresh or dried. When you start blending herbs together for a more complex flavor, your notes will come in handy.

Well-tended culinary herbs are harvested during there leaf making stage. All herbs have two phases of growth: the leaf stage and the flower stage. The flower stage is also called the reproductive stage. When the plant enters it's flowering stage, leaf production slows down or stops. The leaves on the plant may become bitter, woody, grassy, or yellowed. These leaves are not of good quality for cooking. The flowering stage can be delayed by harvesting the herbs often. If your herb plants grow too fast, you can dry or process the extra for later use.

You can use the colorful, fragrant flowers for garnishing salads, and desserts. You might want to have two of the same herb plant. One for allowing to flower and one that can be kept pruned for leaves.

For you beginner chiefs out there, start with the herbs listed below. You will find yourself trying other herbs before you know it.

1. Chives - Fresh or Frozen.
Chives are an excellent choice for those who want onion/garlic flavor, but are a milder flavor than an onion or garlic.
The leaves can be used in soups, salads, salad dressings, eggs, dips, vegetables, chicken, soft cheese spreads, butter, white sauces, and fish.
The flowers can be used in salads.

2. English Thyme - Fresh or Dried.
The leaves can be used in soft cheeses, chowders, vegetables, beef, fish, and tomato sauce.

3. Tarragon - (French or Spanish) - Fresh or Dried.
Tarragon is a bittersweet herb with a hint of licorice flavor, too much can overwhelm your dish so use sparingly.
The leaves can be used in tomato juice, butters, vinegars, salads, sauces, mustards, eggs, and soups. Tarragon is great in marinades for chicken, fish, lamb, and pork.

4. Greek Oregano - Fresh or Dried.
Oregano became popular in the US due to servicemen returning from World War II demanding pizza, yet it has always been popular in the Mediterranean.
Use it in sauces (white and tomato), soups, fish, stews, vegetables, pork, butters, and vinegars.

5. Rosemary - Fresh or Dried.
Rosemary is a versatile, aromatic herb.
Great when used on beef, lamb, fish, and poultry. Use it in stuffing, soups, stews, and fruit cups.

6. Sage - Fresh or Dried.
Sage was once prized for its medicinal value; the most popular use for sage these days is in stuffing for the Thanksgiving turkey. Sage helps digest grease in fatty foods as an added bonus.
Leaves can be used in stuffing, eggs, poultry, pork, beef, lamb, pasta, cheeses, sauces, soups, beef stews, and vegetables.

7. Basil - Fresh or Dried
Basil is one of the most widely used herbs in the world. You can use it in pesto to spaghetti sauces to dessert treats; basil runs wild in the kitchen.