DIY Herb Seasoning Mix

As summer starts coming to a close, you can start collecting and drying all those herbs from your garden and make your own, signature herb seasoning mix! This one shown in this post is actually a mix from my mom’s house, and I’ll tell you all about what I included in a minute, but for now, let’s talk about how special this project can be.

I just spent the last year or so at my parents’ house in Florida, recently moving back to Chicago. My parent’s have always kept a small garden, mostly herbs and tropical fruit, like pineapple, pomegranate, passionfruit and starfruit. Since Parker is old enough to participate, I created a little space to grow some veggies this year. We had these purple heirloom carrots, cucumbers, sunflowers, radishes, rainbow chard and tomatoes. Florida heat and bugs claimed most of our plants and something (rats? birds? hornworms?) came for the tomatoes (seriously- we had 7 giant plants full of tomatoes- only about 4 actual tomatoes made it to us.). The carrots were the real success- they thrived. They were purple, sweet and gorgeous. They had the most gorgeous greens too that did not go to waste — we made carrot green pesto (an absolute favorite), sautéed them in various dishes (they are very mild, have a slight carrot flavor), and dried some to include in this mix.

Year round my mom has other herbs like rosemary; bushes that are 5 or 6 years old and very shrub-like. They are large and manicured and do very well in the heat. I love that they remain and don’t have to be replanted like some of the more delicate herbs. Oregano is another that does well in the heat. It spreads and spreads into a bushy ground cover and needs trimming often, a great reason to harvest and always have it on hand. Italian basil, lemon basil, thyme, parsley, marjoram are all the other herbs we grew and cooked with too. And those little flecks of color? Those are dried orange and yellow nasturtium flowers, an edible salad flower that tastes like arugula.

We spent the last year using these herbs to season everything we cooked with and I spent time collecting them as they grew. Drying a handful or two every couple weeks and storing them in a big jar. I get to keep this jar as a reminder of my time there with my family and can continue to cook with all those same flavors now that I’ve moved. It reminded me of a story I heard a while back about Middle Eastern women and their spices. A girl had moved to the US from the Middle East, and her mother had sent her a jar of spices. Every year all the women in the village would come together with their harvest of herbs and spices and combine them and divvy them up, so every year the spice mix was slightly different, but it always tasted like home.

Our DIY Summer Herb Seasoning:

Use any combination of herbs you have on hand, or stick to a theme {Example, an Italian Mix: thyme, oregano, basil,rosemary}. Below is what we included. Trim your herbs often (before they begin to flower) so they continue to yield all summer.

To dry them: Wash them gently and pat dry. tie them into neat little bundles with kitchen twine and hang upside down (they say hanging upside down helps retain their color) and store in a cool, dry place until they are dried out and crisp. Remove leaves from the stems and discard hard woody stems. Store in an air-tight jar.

Avoid crushing the leaves, leaving them whole will help keep the oils and aromatics intact- then, when cooking, crush them gently into the food you’re seasoning.  For portions, some herbs are stronger then others, so be mindful of the ratios you’re using. For example, there is about 3 times the amount of parsley to 1 part rosemary in this mix. You’ll find these herbs will be stronger than store-bought dried herbs because they are much fresher.

Because this herb mix is fresh and does not have preservatives, I add salt to keep moisture out and to prevent contamination. You can use as much or as little as you like, I used about 3 tablespoons to 2 cups dried herbs. The salt will mostly fall down to the bottom, but it will help keep your jar fresh.

Herb Salt Rub: You can also make an herb salt with 1 cup salt to 2 cup herbs, this time working the herbs into the salt to release their oils and flavor the salt. Let sit at least over night before using. This makes a great rub for meat or seasoning for vegetables.

Use your DIY Herb Seasoning Mix to season meat, veggies, soups, pastas, or anything else you would use herbs in.