Spice of the week: French Tarragon (week of 21-25 June 2010)
Tarragon is easy to grow and only wants sunlight and not too much water. Fresh tarragon is always handy in your kitchen, as it's delicate flavour is lovely in scrambled eggs and even white rice. In place of dill butter on baked fresh fish, substitute fresh tarragon for a new dimension of taste. If you take the time to make hollandaise sauce for your Eggs Benedict, try chopping some fresh tarragon very finely and adding it to the mix for added flavour. Or, add it to your basic chicken salad, along with some diced apples.
Basically, anywhere you can use a delicate, pleasing taste, you can use tarragon. Mixing it with other herbs or strong spices like hot peppers or thyme will over-shadow it, so use it where it's dainty flavour can shine alone.
Roscoe's Kitchen features French cuisine this week. French tarragon, an anise-scented herb, is especially popular in French seafood dishes and it pairs nicely with mustard, too. A cousin of the sunflower plant, tarragon grows best in warm, bright sunlight and a slightly rocky soil. Corresponding to its species name, a common term for the plant is "dragon herb." It is native to a wide area of the Northern Hemisphere from easternmost Europe across central and eastern Asia to India, western North America, and south to northern Mexico. The North American populations may, however, be naturalised from early human introduction.- Photo from homegrown-harvest.com/herbs.html
