Coriander

This year when we were finding out that our dried herbs were going to be a hit, I immediately started thinking of combinations and new herbs that we could do. I was thinking of all the herbs that we grew and thinking if we dried all of them and if not could we. We dry everything except for Cilantro and Chives.

I had read up on the chives and everything I read said that they needed to be freeze dried. I figured that was out of the question. But I did come across one article that stated the person had used a dehydrator. Well needless to say I was intrigued and wanted to try it. I got my dehydrator prepped and ready and began dehydrating! The entire house smelled of an onion smell! I was getting very excited thinking it was working. After they seemed dry enough I took them out of the dehydrator and prepped them and put them in a jar to save until packaging. Which is what I normally do with new herbs to make sure that they will hold up and how they will react. I am very glad that I did this because after a few weeks, they started to turn brown. They were not rotting, they were just loosing their color and scent, which also means they were loosing their flavor. So I decided that was something that we were not going to do.

Cilantro on the other hand. I had never even thought to harvest the coriander off of it. I really thought this was going to be a long, tedious process. Eric and I started researching and figuring out if this was something that we could do. It was much easier than we had thought. Basically we do nothing until the plant starts to look like it is dieing.  That sounds easy!



This is the stage we are at right now.
This is not my photo, just one off the internet.



I had some Cilantro potted plants that I had let go to seed at the stand on purpose so I could closely watch the process. I was checking them pretty often and saw that they had flowered, I was getting excited. I then didn't check them in a few days and when I checked them I believe on Thursday of last week I saw all these little green coriander balls where the flowers had fallen off! So...first step complete. Next step is going to be the seeds turning purple. I will let you know when that happens.

God knows I can never get pictures on here much anymore so I am not going to promise, but I will try to get some pictures on here tomorrow for wordless Wednesday and show you what I am talking about.

Like I said before, I really have taken a new interest in this. I am looking closer at the different stages of herbs and their properties. This is just another exciting learning moment for me!