Make Your Own Herb Salt to Use With Just About Anything

I found the cutest little retro cookbook at a thrift store the other day. It’s all about cooking with herbs — fresh, dried, ground, whole — herbs are amazing! I’ve gotten so much inspiration from this book. I’ve even started growing an herb garden! My basil, dill, thyme, and rosemary are all doing well, and I’ve been so excited to use them in my cooking.

Many of the recipes in my herb cookbook call for “herb salt,” and it shows how you can make your own, starting with a base blend and then working your way up to more adventurous herb flavors. This is such a great way to liven up a meal — I can’t wait to get the salts I ordered in so I can make it!

Homemade Herb Salt Blend

Adapted from Herb Cookery by Alan Booker, 1973

Equipment:

• Mortar and pestle

Start with:

• 1 teaspoon garlic salt (you could dehydrate and grind your own garlic to mix with salt, or you could buy real, organic garlic salt here*)
• 2 teaspoons onion salt (similarly, you could dehydrate and grind your own onions, or buy real organic onion salt here*)
• 1 teaspoon dry parsley (could dry and grind your own, or buy organic parsley here)

*Note: The salts available on Amazon are sold through a third party without the free shipping benefit. You could alternatively buy the Redmond’s salts from Vitacost, which has a huge selection of stuff and offers free shipping for orders of $49 or more — click here to get a $10 coupon.)

Then next time, try adding to the above:

• 1/2 teaspoon basil (find organic basil here)
• 1/2 teaspoon marjoram (find a huge case of it here, or order from Vitacost)

To release the flavors of the herbs, grind them with a mortar and pestle. It also serves to blend them up nicely before they go into the salt mixture. You can do this with either dry or fresh herbs.

These two extra herbs are mild and good for beginning herb salt experimenters. So once you’re familiar enough with the strength of the herbs and how much you like to use, add in a pinch of the following next time if you’re feeling a bit more daring:

• Thyme (find organic thyme here)

and/ or

• Mint (find dried mint here)

You can use your herb salt pretty much anywhere that you’d use plain salt! As a meat rub, over veggies, eggs, soup, sauces, salads, whatever you’d like!

What do you think?

How would you use an herb salt blend? Do you use a lot of herbs in your cooking? I’m sure starting to love them!

 

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