Spice Up Summer Meals With Fresh HerbsBy Lyra Pappin [Nutrition & Diet]
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 MintNothing says summer like fresh fruit and nothing goes better with fruit than freshly grown mint. Spearmint is the most common and works amazingly with strawberries and raspberries. Try roughly chopping a variety of fruit and toss with honey and mint for a satisfying treat. Alternatively, add some fresh mint to plain or vanilla yogurt for an aesthetically pleasing pairing that your taste buds won't mind either! Oregano Oregano's most common use is in spaghetti sauce, so take that as a hint and pair it with tomatoes. Fresh oregano can be grown easily in gardens and added to any tomato dish. Try halving tomatoes, sprinkling with salt and oregano and putting them straight on the barbecue. Bruschetta is also spiced up with fresh oregano, which is actually milder in taste than the dried version. Oregano also pairs well with carrots, which can be coated with olive oil, salt and pepper, some red pepper flakes and lime juice, then placed on the grill. Rosemary Rosemary is one of my personal favourites as it is so surprisingly versatile! Amazingly fragrant, woodsy, hearty and appetite-stimulating, sprigs of rosemary are so easy to grow that it would be a shame not to have them. Boil baby potatoes and while warm, toss with olive oil, freshly chopped garlic, sea salt and rosemary for a delicious side dish. Another great use of rosemary is to press the needles directly into either homemade or freshly bought bread, drizzle with olive oil and put under the broiler for 5 minutes. If you want to introduce rosemary to your main dishes, toss them in a pot of stew or press the whole rosemary sprig right into sirloin or rib-eye steaks and let them infuse the meat while grilling on the barbecue. Thyme Fresh thyme is lemony, golden and great! Thyme has delicate and lovely leaves that pair well with almost all vegetables. It is a fantastic herb for fresh fish, especially the lemon thyme variety. Make a marinade by stripping the leaves from their stem, mixing with olive oil, salt, pepper and a bit of freshly chopped garlic and shaking it all together. Put it with your fish in a plastic baggie and allow it to marinate for an hour before placing on the grill. _________________________________ let your garden grow Fresh herbs are incredibly inexpensive when grown yourself and can really bring the simplest foods to life. They are also hard to mess up, so feel free to experiment! Mix them together, find out which ones you prefer and before you know it, you’ll wonder how you ever got through a dinner without them. Sources: Notebook Magazine GardenHerbs.org |
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