Sage Advice

Thank you to a friend who recently shared bags of wonderful herbs from her garden with us. What a treat for these apartment dwellers! To help make the fragrant leaves last longer, I refrigerated, froze and cooked with some of them. I started with the sage leaves.

For best results with any herb or vegetable in the fridge, I always add a paper towel or two to the open plastic bag of vegetables. This will help to moderate the moisture in the bag. You could also use a paper bag or cloth towel. Don’t wash the vegetables or herbs until you are ready to use them.

I froze a small plastic bag of sage leaves after cleaning them and separating the leaves from the stems. Once they were dried on a towel, I put them in a small plastic baggie and lightly pressed the air out, labeled the package and stored it in the freezer. These frozen leaves will be great for soups, pasta sauces and marinating meats or vegetables throughout the winter.

With some of the fresh leaves, I again cleaned and dried them before adding a handful of them to olive oil with a touch of salt, pepper, balsamic vinegar and crushed garlic. This is a great salad dressing and marinade that will store for a few days in the fridge. (If the leaves are wet, the olive oil can potentially grow mold.) I poured some of the dressing on an avocado salad and used the rest to marinate pork chops.

What do you do with your herbs?