Saturday, October 23, 2010

the year of tarragon

I tend a small kitchen herb garden by the back entrance of our home and every year it flourishes. My lavender especially. By whim, this year, I decided to plant some French tarragon. It's pretty and I thought maybe I could use it in some recipes (even though until now I hadn't used it very much at all).

Over the summer, I became obsessed with its sweet licorice flavor and started snipping it into everything from fresh green salads and dressings to lemony pasta and mussels steamed in white wine.

My other herbs got the cold shoulder this year, but I believe they've have their fair share of time in the sun. This year is the year for tarragon.

And it's still flourishing—even amidst frosts and snow flurries.

This morning, I discovered a new sweeter side of tarragon and my taste buds were just blown away. I was making myself a breakfast parfait with a chopped honeycrisp apple, some banana, plain whole milk yogurt, a touch of maple syrup and some granola on top. I wanted to snip some basil in, but the basil in my garden has gone by and there's no mint either. But tarragon? Yes, there's still tons. And I thought to myself, "This might be crazy, but I'm willing to give it a try!"

And you know what? It was really quite wonderful.

Now I'm sitting here typing and nibbling on some fresh tarragon leaves—tastes just like candy!—and I felt the need to share my obsession.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I love tarragon, and it certainly deserves this wonderful regale!! A lot of the other herbs that we use have, in my humble opinion, run the good race, and we need to branch out, as you have done, to explore the amazing world of herbs. Well done on adding it to your parfait! I habitually use it in Tarragon Chicken, and rabbit stew, as well as snipping it into veggies and salads.

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