We Love Cooking!:
tips

Winter is coming so quickly this year, but I want to make sure I hang on to the best of the summer in my cooking during the coming cold months. How you ask? The answer- home dried herbs!

If you've been growing herbs in your garden all summer like me, this is probably one of your last chances this year to make the most of them. Plus home drying herbs is so simple and fun and they also make a great Christmas pressie for fellow food lovers!

Drying herbs can really bring out some intense flavors, which can often be even tastier than there fresh counterparts. They are a fantastic addition to recipes and I love using them to intensify the flavors of soups, stews, and sauces. Hardy herbs like Thyme, Rosemary, Oregano, Bay, and Sage, are perfect for drying and in most cases the natural oils are not depleted during the process.
Try to harvest the herbs on a dry day, mid morning just after the dew has dried, this will ensure the herbs are at their freshest when you pick them.

Here are my tips for harvesting and drying herbs! :

1. Snip the herbs at the stem.
2. Choose nice long branches and pick off any dead leaves.
3. Give the stems a gentle shake to remove any insects or dirt. (You can choose to give the herbs a quick wash, but make sure to dry on kitchen paper, as moisture can cause rot.)
4. Bundle a good handful of the stems together and tie at the bottom with twine tightly. (As the herbs dry, you may need to tighten the knot)
5. Hang the herbs in a warm dry place, I hang mine in a small room just over the water heater, so they're kept nice and warm!
6. The time it takes to dry the herbs will depend on their moisture content, but in most cases when the stems crack and no longer bend, they are ready to be stored.
7. Store the dried herbs in an airtight container and leave the leaves uncrushed until you're ready to use them.

You know one of those days where everything seems to be a little bit off center? The days where everything just doesn't go as planned? Well yesterday was definitely one of those days, it started off with a phone call from my dear old mammy, claiming she couldn't find her booking on Ryanair and wanted help to locate it. Being the ever accommodating son, I spent the next forty minutes, trying every combination of reference number, credit card number, and email to try and retrieve it from the Ryanair website to absolutely no avail.

I eventually gave up after the website told me I had too many unsuccessful login attempts, and gave her a call to inform her of this. But was she bothered? No! And let me tell you why- during the time I was banging my head against the computer screen, she had gone back too her notes and realised that her booking was with, wait for it.... AER LINGUS!!! You see this is what I have to deal with! Anyone else out there with parents suffering from technical difficulties? I'm sure there are!

(Sorry Mammy...)

As I arrived home, I went to get the lift up to the apartment, but the electricity seemed to be on half voltage, so it wasn't working. Got up to the apartment, NO WATER AND NO ELECTRICITY! That was my grand plan for baked Mackerel in tinfoil out the window. But the panic of the blackout seemed to have gotten to poor little Sofie, who develops a serious problem when she is hungry- she looses the ability to think rationally and until she gets food, goes into severe depression. So we needed food fast, and despite all my cold food suggestions- we had to eat out!

After a lovely meal at the Orangerie in Malahide (always order the specials), we got home and went to get the lift up, which still wasn't working. I had given my security key for the outside doors to our visitor, so I didn't have one on my bunch, which meant disaster struck one more time, when we realised no one else had their keys with them, which resulted in standing outside until someone came out!

It was definitely one of those days...

That's my little rant over for now, sorry to put all of that on you! To make up for it, here is a really handy little dressing to make when you're short on ingredients and time.

Quick Mayo Caesar Style Dressing

1. 2 Tbsp of Mayonnaise.
2. 1 Tsp of English Mustard Powder.
   
3. 1 Tsp of Worcester Sauce.
4. Juice of Half a Lemon.
5. 1 Clove of Garlic Finely Minced.
6. A Good Pinch of Sea Salt and Freshly Ground Pepper.

Unfortunately, the convenience of picking up a pre-washed bag of designer salad leaves has quickly become common place in our modern lives. In fact in 2005, the bagged salad market was growing at 7 percent a year and was estimated to be worth over 1.2 billion dollars a year in the US. However success stories aside, the gases and chemicals sometimes used in the production of these bags, add unnecessary toxins which our bodies can seriously do without. A normal salad leaf will last about 4-5 days in the fridge where as some of these cut salad leaves can keep on looking fresh for a whopping 10 days! That just can't be right!

There is nothing more satisfying than preparing your own salad leaves which you know were produced locally. It's a much greener kitchen practice, and it tastes so much better. I actually got the idea to write a post about this because Sofie had never seen anyone washing salad leaves before me, (she has led a very sheltered life in Sweden ;) and thought maybe there were a few people out there like her who didn't know the easy process to do so.

There are so many exciting salad leaves you can choose from, so be adventurous, it'll make the difference when it comes to plating up! Here's my quick and simple steps to preparing salad:

1. Fill your sink with cold water.
2. Remove any packadging from your Salad and cut out the core or seperate the leaves from the stem.
3. Submerge the leaves in the water and give them a good swill, allow to sit for about 10 mins. (This will allow dirt to settle to the bottom, and the cold water will bring wilted leaves back to life.)
4. Take a handful of leaves out of the water at a time and spin in a salad spinner until they are completely dry. (Salad Spinners can be picked up relatively cheap, I got mine for 5 Euro. Moisture is not your friend here as it will shorten the life of the stored leaves, so make sure they're dry.)
5. Store the leaves swaddled in a dry tea towel, or in an airtight zipper bag, in the bottom crisper drawer of your fridge . The leaves will last anywhere between 4-6 days depending on the leaf.