Tuscan Herb Salt Recipe

"Tuscan Herb Salt is good on so many things. I have seen where some people think it is only good as a finishing salt, but I think it is equally useful at any stage of a meal. You can sprinkle it on scrambled eggs, or cooked vegetables. Try rubbing a little olive oil on the surface of skinless, boneless chicken breast, and sprinkle the salt generously on both side before grilling or pan frying. The same treatment is wonderful with cut slabs of zucchini or summer squash, or steak or pork chops, or fish. Use it when you are mashing potatoes, or making rice. Any savory dish where you would use salt would get an extra pop of flavor from this blend. It would also make a really unique gift, and if you make it during the summer, it will still be fantastic when we get to the holidays, so it might be a good idea to whip up extra to give as gifts. Combinations of herbs I like to use are lemon zest, rosemary and sage on chicken, and rosemary, thyme, Greek oregano and sage are good on most anything. PLEASE NOTE: I would not use table salt to make this recipe. It will end up being too salty, because the grains are so fine, and table salt has a higher sodium content than Kosher or Sea salts do. You can use this as soon as you make it, but for longer storage, you need to let it dry out pretty well, before sealing it up in a container. It's good to line a baking sheet with parchment paper, and spread the salt out in a thin layer to dry. Courtesy of Thecreeksidecook."

Original is 8 servings

Metric US

I've Tried It

Ingredients

Add to Shopping List

2 to 3 garlic cloves (large cloves)
1/4 cup sea salt, coarse (Celtic Sea salt or Kosher salt, or a mixture NOT table salt)

2 cups fresh herb leaves (any combination of rosemary, sage, thyme, oregano, savory, dill, parsley, tarragon, chervil, basil, etc.)

Nutritional

Serving Size: 1 (69.1 g)
Calories 1.7
Total Fat - 0 g
Saturated Fat - 0 g
Cholesterol - 0 mg
Sodium - 3537.4 mg
Total Carbohydrate - 0.4 g
Dietary Fiber - 0 g
Sugars - 0 g
Protein - 0 g
Calcium - 4.7 mg
Iron - 0.1 mg
Vitamin C - 0.2 mg
Thiamin - 0 mg

Step by Step Method

Step 1

Peel the garlic cloves and chop fairly finely on a large cutting board

Step 2

Add the salt (if using a food processor, only put in half the amount of salt to begin, adding the rest to process the second half).

Step 3

Make sure the herbs are clean and free of any stems (you only want to use the leaves), and pile over top of the garlic and salt.

Step 4

Using a large chef's knife, chop through the mixture with a rocking motion, first in one direction, then turn the board and chop in the other direction.

Step 5

Use the blade of the knife, or a bench scraper to scrape the mixture back into a pile, and chop through everything again.

Step 6

Repeat the scraping into a pile, and chopping over and over, until you have finely minced herbs.

Step 7

The garlic and salt will also get chopped as you go along, but it is the herbs that you want to get into very small bits, then the rest will be the right size too. This will take around 6-10 minutes, depending on how fast you are.

Step 8

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, and spread the mixture in a thin layer to dry, which will take 2-5 days, depending on the weather. If you used Celtic salt, it will still feel a little moist, which is fine.