Hello,
There is a great article on Cilantro in the April 2005 Issue of Carolina Gardener. If I can get a reprint of the article I will try to post it here.
Peter
Cilantro???
What a nice gesture, MaVie. I'd love to grow some kintsai and I bet others would also! It sounds like a necessary ingredient for some of your recipes.
SherryLike, maybe it will grow better for you than cilantro does?
Ah yes, St Patrick's Day is tomorrow! Your recipe sounds perfect (especially since it will be cold and rainy here tomorrow and that would be nice to have simmering on the stove)!
hi Peter... welcome to DG. we sure welcome all info we can get.
Shoe, in the P.I. the boiled meat i posted for St. Patrick is accompanied with a nice miso sauce.
3-4 tbsp olive oil
2-5 garlic, roughly minced
1 medium chop onions
3-5 pcs tomatoes, roughly chopped
2 tbsp miso
sauté garlic in olive oil, until lightly browned or fragrance of garlic emit. add the onions, then tomatoes. once sauce consistency is achieve then add the miso. allow to simmer a few minutes and sauce is ready for the boiled meat.
if u want to add a wee bit hotness on the sauce, i always throw in 1 tsp of pepper flakes. yummm-EEE! since i love hot food, i use fresh habañero instead of pepper flakes.
Peter...WELCOME TO DG! (I think we were posting at the same time...didn't see your post til just now.)
You are not that far from us. More and more DGers are in NC now...we'll have to get them all together sometime, eh?
MaVie, I LOVE miso!!! That sounds delish!! Thanks for the tip! Yummy! (And yes, I too like hot foods!)
Hello Peter!! I just realized that you are new to DG. I've only been here a little over a year. Lots of good stuff to read and very nice people. I spend the majority of my time at the brug & friends forum. Welcome!!!
Check out Culantro (Johnny's, amongst others) - I understand from 2 friends who have tried it that it has the flavor of Cilantro, but is far hardier. I'm trying it this season for the first time!
Culantro is very popular in Thai dishes. been looking for a source before. thanks for the tip.
It seems like most of you folks live where it's really warm or hot in the summer. It's got to be the climate. Here on the shores of beautiful Lake Superior in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, I plant cilantro (coriander seeds) every year and have a wonderful crop. I even dropped a few sees accidentally in the turf and they too sprouted. It's got to be the weather!
I believe you are correct, it's too hot here, once the real heat hits, it's bu-bye...
I swear by Culantro, the tropical version of Cilantro. I prefer the taste and it grows all year long down here. If you don't let it go to seed, it will stay leafy. Last time I let it go to seed I still had plenty of leaves to use. I have the seeds if anyone wants them.
I was recently researching a few of these "cilantro" plants for something else.
Culantro's plant latin is Eryngium foetidum, and it is in the plant family Apiaceae, which includes Parsley, Fennel, and Dill. Another name I see it as around here is "Saw Leaf Herb". Note, same Genus as Sea Holly!
Coriander or Cilantro's plant latin is Coriandrum sativum, and it is also in the plant family Apiaceae. A lot of times, if you have coriander in your spice rack, it will sprout from that. Interestingly, each coriander capsule has the seeds for two plants, so it is technically a fruit, not a seed.
Another "Cilantro" is Vietnamese Cilantro, Polygonum odoratum, which is in the Polygonaceae Family, which includes things like Buckwheat, Sorrel, Rhubarb, Dock, and Knotweed.
By the way, a great resource for herb and plant information is called, "Gernot Katzer's Spice Pages".
http://www-ang.kfunigraz.ac.at/~katzer/engl/
That site is fantastic but it lacks the tropical spices. Very very cool tho.
Wellllll .. I am certainly more enlightened, folks ..
Thanks so much, for the sharing of the wealth of info about Cilantro.
Sherrylike, we're a wee cooler than you - here in the Arkansas mtns ... and the Cilantro does very well. Just gotta get it in the ground amply early ...
And am abreast of a plenty of other tidbits to give a try also.
- Magpye
Just found this thread - have been hanging out mostly in hostas.
Up here, Cilantro seed will over winter; so if you let old plants go to seed you'll have lots coming up next spring. And it definitely tends to bolt when the weather gets hot.
As for keeping it, last year my neighbour's garden was overgrown with the stuff and they were on an extended trip. I pick a LOT, threw it in a plastic bag and put it in the freezer. When it was frozen and brittle, I just scrunched it up in the bag. The smell was sufficiently potent that I needed to double bag it. All winter long, I just reached in and got some out to use in cooking. In fact I had so much that I still have a bit left.
Ann
Whatever I have left at the end of the season I just snip to the ground, toss in a paper bag, and use it all season as a dried spice. Tastes better than any spices I can buy and I still have the satisfaction of having grown it! It is the one herb I simply cannot grow indoors. BUmmer!
Thanks, all!!! Cilantro is available all year round here, so I didn't plant a sprig this year, just too hot and dry for it...
Thanks so much, ViolaAnn ..
For the wonderful tidbit about freezing the leaves & scrunching them up for use, as needed.
- Magpye
I was just reading over this thread and wondering if cilantro would do better growing indoors since the hot weather kills it. Anyone???
I can't grow it at all indoors, though I do grow parsley, rosemary, thyme, and basil.
Cilantro, IMO, is just different. I don't have the space to grow it inside, and have no interest anyway as I just don't enjoy houseplants. But, I love it and have tried for years, and years to grow it in the garden and yard gardens with zero luck. One plant I've totally given up attempting to grow...if some smart person develops a variety that will grow, I'll be the first in line...
Cilantro called Corianda or Dhania depending on where you come from, you can get in paste form in tubes in the supermarkets, powdered form also in supermarkets but if you want value for money, go to the Indian(Asian shops) and get fresh or powdered. It can be used in all forms of cooking and eaten fresh on salads. Add it to meat dishes - but whatever you do don't try to freeze it! it goes black and slimy not at all nice. I haven't tried to grow it here.
By the way, my experience with the Culantro was excellent. It grows year 'round in a shallow planter in the sunroom and tastes wonderful!
my cilantro as I mentioned earlier in this thread, is growing indoors and is doing quite well up to this point. I am hoping I will be able to keep it that way. I think it likes a lot of watering because it doesnt look as nice if I skip a day or two.
Good for you! Mine never grows well indoors, and bolts like crazy outdoors. (Not that I let that hinder me - I still grow it! The smell alone is worth the work!)
seemama - as to whether to freeze it or not, probably depends on how you are going to use it. I use it cooked in Chili and have had very good success with freezing it, but I wouldn't use it in a salad. Up here in Canada, I have no difficutly finding it fresh in my regular supermarkets when I don't have it in the garden.
Ann
Hi Ann, I use it in curries. But I do enjoy eating it fresh. Down here in Florida it's available also rooted plants in the supermarket, I am just starting my herb garden, but not too sure on what to put where, I have my Rosemary my grandson put weed killer on my first plant for me! so I have another, I used to grow chives, curley parsley, mint, tarragon etc. without any problems in my old home, but it's very different here - soil is quite sandy. Glad to see you have some nice hot weather up there today.
Ann, what do you do with it when you freeze it? Please pass on your formula.
seemama - check about 13 posts up this thread where I've described it.
Ok Ann, I got it, and I will try it, I have to get some today and will try half of it. Thanks for the tip, I used to chop it and make it into Ice Cubes, but it went black and turned the meal black with it! bit like old mushrooms!
I thought it was just me. I've killed every cilantro plant I've had.
I thought it WANTED to be in the sun and heat, thinking it was a southernish plant.
Where's the head slapping smiley?
My neighbor is Hmong (from Laos) and she taught me what to do for the best harvest of Cilantro (which she loves and grows, now, too).
Allow your plants that you already have to go to seed. Harvest those seeds and keep them in a coffee can. Then plant your seeds in September. Water them in well, and you'll get seedlings by the time cold weather starts to come around you'll have a pretty nice harvest of the nice tasty flat leaves. Don't harvest it all, though!
Leave the small plants and cover them with leaves (and the saved branches from when you get the seeds harvested) and it will be fine under the snow all winter. In spring, uncover them and you'll have an early crop from which you start again!
This gives you two harvests of each - the seeds as coriander and the leaves as cilantro.
BTW she calls Cilantro "chinese parsley" too. And her native language is Hmong, which from what I understand an Asian combination of French, Thai, Lao, and Chinese along with the ancient tribal mountain langauge!
Ann, I have been using your method of freezing, it"s brilliant - thanks for a good idea! I have been buying a few bunches at a time and freezing up and then adding to food as required.
Janie. It's in my cook books as 'also Chinese Parsley' and fortunately we have no snow in Florida - yippee!
Janie - great idea to sow in the autumn. I generally don't get an autumn crop, but I notice that the seeds which have self-sowed in the garden and come up in the spring do the best.
Ann
Can fresh basil be frozen for out of season use?? Or is there a better way??
Fresh basil freezes very well. It just doesn't like to sit in the fridge.
We make pesto sauce, pour it into ice cube trays, then put in the freezer. I pop the frozen cubes of pesto into a freezer bag to use in the off season.
For plain chopped herbs, I usually put them into ziplock freezer bags and flatten the bag before pushing the final seal closed. It's easy to stack the bags of frozen basil and parsley in the freezer. Because the frozen herbs are relatively thin, it's easy to break some off when you need it.
Do you chop your basil first?? And, do you have a recipe for pesto sauce and how do you use it, that is, spaghetti or soup, other??
I freeze basil, oregano, mixtures of herbs and garlic, etc all the same way... strip the leaves off the stems, mince to a rough paste in the food processor, and add a little oil (olive oil or vegetable oil, depending on how I plan to use the herbs). Freeze in ice cube trays, then pop into freezer bags for storage. It's useful to keep track of how much fresh made how many cubes, so you can mark your bag (for example, 1 cube = 1/4 cup fresh basil).
Pesto:
2 cups fresh basil leaves (tightly packed)
2 Tablespoons pine nuts
2 medium cloves of fresh garlic
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 - 1/3 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
Salt to taste
Put the pine nuts, garlic and basil leaves in the food processor and process until they are finely chopped. You'll probably need to scrape down the bowl several times to get everything chopped. Turn the motor on, slowly pour the oil through the feed tube. Blend until everything is smooth. Scrape the sauce into a bowl and add the fresh grated cheese. Stir well. Taste and add salt as needed.
If you are not going to use this immediately, it will keep in the fridge in an air tight container for several days. If you need to keep it longer, pour a thin layer of olive oil over the top of the pesto.
We like to use this sauce on pasta, on gnocci, on baby new potatoes, as a seasoning for sauteed summer vegies, as a dollop in a bowl of vegetable stew or soup......
You can use this for any recipe that says "au pistou" as "pistou" is the simply the french name for pesto.
I've even added some of this to a basic vinaegrette salad dressing.
Forgot to mention, if I'm just freezing the basil or parsley to use as a general seasoning later, I just chop it and put it in the freezer bags. It's easy to crumble into a measuring cup later if you've flattened the bag before freezing.