Green Life – how to dry herbs

One thing I truly miss in the winter is getting into my garden. I’m not saying that we don’t go outside in the winter, but I miss the work of growing and harvesting food and flowers. With frosty nights arriving I know that sadly, it is time to shut down the gardens. I have already pulled out the cucumber vine and the beans have stopped producing. The tomatoes have a few green fruits still hanging on and my swiss chard is still thriving…a great fall weather veggie. It is hard for me to believe that the little herb seeds I planted so long ago in egg cartons are now ready to be harvested. One of the easiest ways to use herbs is by drying them…but how? I brought my daughters into the garden and we set to work.

kitchen twine

large tray
salad spinner

scissors

screws/screwdriver

large Ziploc bag

glass storage jar

1. start by cutting back your thyme plant (or herb of choice), pile on a large tray and bring indoors HOT TIP when laying the cut herbs on the tray be sure to keep them all facing the same direction – making it easier to bundle in a moment

2. rinse herbs under water and spin in a salad spinner to dry

4. suspend the kitchen twine between two screws or hooks…we installed 2 screws and painted them white so they would not be noticeable when they are not in use

5. create a pile of cut pieces of twine, approximately 6″ long

6. bundle handfuls of thyme and wrap tightly with twine, leaving long piece of twine hanging 

7. loop and knot the long hanging pieces of twine, on each bundle, around the suspended piece of twine

8. try not to bunch them together on the string…hang undisturbed for about one week

9. once the branches are dry and crunchy, cut the loops off the suspended twine and place one bundle inside a large Ziploc bag

10. with the herb bundle in the bag rub the bag and watch the leaves fall off the branches (the girls especially loved this step)

11. open the bag, remove the branches and dump the leaves into the storage jar

Every step of this process I did with my daughters. We had a lot of fun. We filled over 1 small mason jar with dry leaves. This will last our family until next spring…or we are thinking about using our dried herbs in some sort of Christmas presents. Now that our thyme is dried we are hanging up our oregano. We are also going to attempt to transplant our rosemary plant and bring it indoors for the winter. Do you have any tips for bringing herbs indoors? I’ve never done this before…fingers crossed.