Culinary Herbs

Thyme is quiet and floral and slightly earthy - the herb you notice only when it is missing.Refrigerate in a loose bag for up to two weeks. Run a thumb and forefinger down the stem to strip the leaves, or add whole sprigs early...

Fresh sage is savoury and faintly musky, with a velvet leaf that crisps beautifully in butter.Refrigerate in a loose bag for a week to ten days. Chiffonade the leaves for raw use, or fry whole leaves thirty seconds in butter until they stop sizzling....

Cut rosemary is resinous and piney with a camphor lift, strong enough that a single sprig will carry a whole pan.Wrap loosely and refrigerate for two weeks or more - it is the longest-keeping cut herb on the bench. Strip the needles from the...

Purple basil trades some of the sweetness of the green for a spicier, clove-leaning edge - and it stains a vinegar or a lemonade deep rose.Never refrigerate basil; it blackens below about 50F. Stand the stems in water on the counter, out of direct...

Peppermint reads cold on the tongue - higher menthol and sharper than spearmint, which is exactly what you want in tea and in anything sweet.Stems in water on the counter or bagged in the fridge for a week. Bruise the leaves rather than chopping...

Flat-leaf parsley is the workhorse - clean, faintly peppery, and the thing that makes everything else on the plate taste more like itself.Stems in water, tops bagged, refrigerated; it will keep a week or more. Chop stems in with the leaves. Add raw or...

Fresh oregano is peppery and warm with a faint bitterness that holds up to long cooking better than almost any other soft herb.Refrigerate in a loose bag for up to a week, or hang a bunch to dry. Strip the leaves from the woody...

The fronds carry a clean sweet anise that is lighter and greener than the bulb, closer to a herb than a vegetable.Wrap loosely and refrigerate for up to a week. Use like dill - raw over fish, citrus and potatoes, or stirred in at...

Fresh dill is sweet and grassy with a faint anise lift, nothing like the flat hay of the dried jar.Keep it dry and cold in a loose bag; five to seven days. Snip the feathery fronds with scissors rather than chopping, and add off...

Cut cilantro is all top notes - citrus, pepper and a green snap that vanishes within about twenty minutes of heat, which is why it belongs on the plate and not in the pot.Stand the stems in an inch of water, bag the tops...

Purple-stemmed Thai basil with a firm leaf and a sharp licorice-anise punch that survives a hot wok where sweet basil simply vanishes.The narrow leaves are sturdier than Italian basil and hold their shape and flavor when stirred into a hot curry or a stir-fry...

True French tarragon, cut in slender sprigs, with a clean anise sweetness and a slight tongue-tingling numbness that no substitute matches.French tarragon is the one worth having; Russian tarragon grows easily and tastes like nothing, which is why so many people think tarragon is...

Large, tender sweet basil leaves cut at peak, sweet and peppery with clove and anise, and unmistakably better than anything shipped cold.Basil is the herb most damaged by refrigeration and transit, which is why a locally cut bunch is a genuinely different product. Use...

Fresh stevia leaves that taste startlingly sweet straight off the stem, with a green herbal edge and a distinct licorice-like aftertaste.This is sold as a garden novelty and a tea leaf, not as a sugar replacement: in the United States only purified steviol glycosides...

Big frilled shiso leaves with a flavor no other herb duplicates: mint, basil, anise, cinnamon, and a cutting citrus edge all at once.Shiso is used leaf by leaf rather than chopped by the handful, since one leaf carries an enormous amount of flavor. Green...

Sweet marjoram cut in soft gray-green sprigs, floral and delicate where its cousin oregano is loud, pungent, and peppery.Marjoram is the gentler member of the family and it fades under long cooking, so add it near the end rather than at the start. Strip...

Thick fresh stalks with a clean lemon-ginger fragrance in the tender white core, plus fibrous green tops that make an excellent broth.Use the bottom four inches, where the stalk is pale and swollen; smash it with the back of a knife and mince finely,...

The most intensely lemon-scented leaf we grow, with a clean perfumed citrus that outclasses lemon balm and holds up in syrups and custards.Lemon verbena leaves are narrow, glossy, and slightly rough, and a single leaf will scent a whole cup or pitcher. It infuses...

Fine woody sprigs that smell like thyme and lemon peel at once, giving you citrus lift in a herb that actually survives long cooking.Unlike soft lemon herbs, lemon thyme holds its character through roasting and braising, which makes it far more useful in the...

Soft, crinkled lemon balm leaves with a gentle citrus-mint scent that is more lemon candy than sharp lemon peel, and best used raw.Lemon balm is a mint relative, so it brings a rounded, sweet citrus rather than acidity, and it will not substitute for...