1,561 easy and fully explained recipes, with +66K photos and 78 videos

This site uses only a few technical cookies necessary for its operation. By continuing to browse, you accept their use.
To find out more...

Herbs and temperature

I have already talked to you about herbs in cooking, and about their great power of "seduction". The example of a salad is a great classic: on its own, it's a salad, which is normal, but the same salad in which you have added finely chopped fresh herbs, just before serving, you have much more than a salad.

Herbs transcend recipes, small addition and big effect, with just a little chives, chervil, parsley, etc.

12 K 4.8/5 (16 reviews)

Keywords for this post:Herbs Cooking Temperature

Last modified on: April 25^th 2020

For this post: Comment Follow Ask me a question Send to a friend

Herbs and temperature

What if we heat it up? What about the herbs that we are going to consume after cooking (vs raw), it's a bit the same principle, we add them to a dish or a recipe, and they always make their little effect?

herbes en cuisson

Well it depends in fact, it depends on the herb itself or more exactly its active principle, its essential oil if you prefer, and which must pass from the herb in the dish for our greatest happiness.

And there attention, all the herbs are not equal, because the active ingredient they contain supports more or less well the heat.

estragon

Here is a specific example, tarragon, its active ingredient is estragol and unfortunately estragol evaporates at 50°C (approximately) which means that if you put it in a dish that goes in the oven for a long time, well it's almost useless because the taste will have evaporated during cooking and in the best case there will just be traces of it. Disappointing...

What to do?

All is not lost, it is enough to proceed differently, and to add the chosen herb at the last moment, the dish already taken out of the oven, and a few minutes before serving. This way you will have the expected taste, and in addition a certain freshness of taste due to the fresh herbs added. This is especially true for herbs that are very sensitive to heat: chives, tarragon and chervil in particular.

It is a little less true for parsley which is less sensitive to heat, and can be cooked better.

Another way to do it is to combine the 2 methods: herbs at the beginning for more nuanced notes, and herbs at the end for fresher and more pronounced notes.

Does this apply to all herbs?

No, there are some that have an active principle with a very high evaporation temperature (like 250°C), but with those you can go ahead and let it simmer or infuse for a long time: bay leaf, thyme and vanilla for example.

To sum up: For a recipe with herbs, and depending on the herbs, it is often better to incorporate the herbs at the end of cooking, chopped up at the minute.

Lasts posts

A tablet holder

Perhaps you too cook by consulting your recipe on a tablet or phone, and putting it down on your worktop? It's practical, but not the best solution. Here's a look at how you can make an inexpensive, almost universal stand.
March 14^th 20263995

Pre-calibrated pastry dough

When making pie dough (shortbread, shortcrust, sweet...), it's always a good idea to make a lot at once, and then divide it into pieces, which you can freeze. I've already pointed out the mistake not to make, which is to form a ball before freezing. It's difficult to roll out afterwards because...
March 9^th 20268275

Butter vs. grease

We often read in a recipe where a pastry is put into a mould that, just before pouring, the mould should be buttered or greased. But what's the difference between these 2 terms?
December 1^st 20252,9265

Getting out of the fridge early

Very often when you're cooking, you need to take food or preparations out of the fridge, to use them in the recipe in progress. There's nothing tricky about this: you just take them out of the fridge and use them, usually immediately, in the recipe. But is this really a good method?
November 24^th 20251,8815

Who's making the croissants?

When you look at a bakery from the outside, you naturally think that in the bakery, the bakers make the bread, and in the laboratory, the pastry chefs make the cakes. It's very often like that, with each of these professions having quite different ways of working, but sometimes there's also one...
November 23^th 20251,709

See all posts Random post RSS feeds

Other pages you may also like

Steam for baking bread

What does steam have to do with bread-making? This is not only a bakers' secret, it is something you might not think of at all: if you make bread and bake it like a cake, you will end up with bread, but pale and with a thick, hard crust – a long way from the golden-brown crusty loaf you had in...
June 16^th 2021149 K4.5

The proper use of a pastry bag

Ever used a pastry bag? Handy, isn't it, but unfortunately not very easy to fill. In fact, to be comfortable with this tool, you'd need 3 or 4 arms, which isn't very common. Does that mean it's a goner? No, of course not. Here are 2 or 3 tips to help you get comfortable with it.
December 5^th 20209,4044.7

Soup vs. potage

It's true that we're finally coming out of winter as I write these lines, and that we'll all be making, no doubt, a little less soup and potages, but even if it's out of season, it really is a simple and delicious dish, which is one of the always easy answers to "What's for dinner this (Sunday)...
April 9^th 202212 K

Good fridge management

We all have a fridge at home – it's an indispensible part of the kitchen and so much a part of the furniture that we tend not to pay it much attention. But often, out of habit, we don't use it properly. Here are a few tips to help you get more from your fridge. .
April 19^th 201130 K4.4

Should I believe my oven?

Can you really trust your oven? This is an important question as we are always tempted to take the temperature indicated as gospel truth and, unfortunately, this is rarely very precise. .
July 4^th 201133 K4.6