It’s raining here in Nova Scotia, which is usual about this time of year. I love rainy days, personally. The plants are vibrant, and the birds are singing, even the teeniest patch of moss turns lush and green. I love the sound of rain pouring down, and the smell of wet earth, growing leaves and woods.
Today seems like a good day to tend to seedlings indoors and do some slow things in the kitchen, I’ve decided to infuse olive oil with herbs and try my hand at making some kind of cheese.
My rosemary and oregano plants are growing fresh leaves again (they slowed down during the winter months) and it is time to take off some of the older growth. I have a big can of cold pressed extra virgin olive oil, corks and glass bottles, so now I’m ready to go. I keep glass bottles from sauces and other things, which I wash and save for projects like this. Sometimes being a pack rat pays off. I found a really sweet champagne cork in my stash, turns out they fit and look great in sauce bottles.
In the end I made five kinds of infused olive oil; oregano, rosemary, lemon pepper, orange basil and garlic. Using my own herbs gives me a lot of pleasure, they seem to grow back just as fast as you pick from them (if done properly) and I know they are grown without pesticides and harmful chemicals. This is the time of year to start seeds or buy young plants from nurseries if you want to start your own kitchen herb garden.
You can make your own oils easily as well. All you need to do is mix herbs and cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil in clean bottles. Simple. Makes great gifts too.
To make the citrus infused oils add the zest from one orange or lemon, along with peppercorns and herbs, to your olive oil. You can substitute dried herbs for fresh. I like to use some sort of oil drizzler, or something with a small opening in the cap to keep whole peppercorns from escaping from the lemon version.
These take some time to infuse, but you can go ahead and taste some right away if you’d like, just top it up bit more cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil. The garlic will taste strong enough by the next day, the others might take a week or two. Enjoy it on bread with balsamic vinegar. (After a few weeks the leaves in some of my first infusions went a bit dark and off, so I now recommend straining the oils after a week or two).
I also recommend you use a funnel, because the first time I tried this I made an oily mess. (I really didn’t want to waste the olivey goodness, so I sopped it up with a piece of cheese cloth and kept the whole thing in a jar to throw in my bath later. It makes a wonderful moisturiser and hair detangler too. When life gives you lemons… =)
Bread being made with Oregano oil
