NEWS for North Dakotans
Agriculture Communication, North Dakota State University
7 Morrill Hall, Fargo, ND 58105-5665

April 22, 1999

Prairie Fare: Putting Herbs into the Mix

Mix friendship, religion and Baltimore and what do you get? Herbs. I was able to attend an herb festival near Baltimore a few years ago because a friend of 25 years was spending the summer in Washington, D.C., completing his vicarship.

Held in a park, the festival reminded me of a street fair, with vendors selling fresh herbs, dried-herb artwork and the like. I bought a bouquet of fresh chervil because I was hoping to impress someone, the woman my friend was seeing at the time—the woman whom I'd met only one day earlier—the woman who, I was certain after only that one day, would bring an end to my friend's decades-long bachelorhood. And she did.

Part of the festivities upon our return from Baltimore that evening included enjoying shrimp cocktail and champagne because I'd turned 40 just a few weeks earlier. When I'd sampled the fresh chervil at the herb festival, I was surprised by its subtle flavor, slightly anise. After the vendor told me that chervil went well with tomatoes, I decided it would make the perfect addition to cocktail sauce, and it did.

We spent many hours the next day standing in the rain on the lawn of the U.S. Capitol, listening to the National Symphony Orchestra play John Phillip Sousa marches and other selections. It was the Memorial Day holiday, and two memories I hold from that weekend are of the cold I caught and the way that fresh chervil embellished the shrimp cocktail with both flavor and color.

A member of the parsley family, chervil grows well in this region an as annual herb, says Ron Smith, NDSU extension horticulturist. But he warns that chervil doesn't transplant well, so backyard gardeners who like to cook with fresh herbs should plant seeds directly where they want plants to grow.

If there's something in life you'd like to celebrate, try Garlic Shrimp with Chervil, a memorable hors d'oeuvre. It's a recipe I've adapted from one on file at the Internet site for Epicurious Food (http://food.epicurious.com).

Garlic Shrimp with Chervil
Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 large garlic cloves, minced
¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes
½ pound medium raw shrimp, peeled and deveined
salt to taste
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon dry white wine
2 tablespoons fresh chervil, chopped

Procedure:
Heat olive oil in a skillet and add garlic. Saute until garlic is softened but not brown, about 2 minutes. Add red pepper, shrimp and salt and cook for about 2 minutes. Turn shrimp and continue cooking until shrimp becomes opaque, about 2 minutes longer. Add the lemon juice and wine, stirring through the shrimp to blend, and cook about 1 minute longer. Divide into 4 servings and sprinkle each with chervil. Accompany with thin slices of oven-toasted Italian or French bread.

What's Your Take on This, Julie?

As most garlic lovers know, the garlic capital of the United States is Gilroy, Calif. You can literally follow your nose on your way to one of its garlic festivals. The folks in Gilroy must be pleased with the current research on garlic, which indicates garlic may not only add flavor to your foods, but it also has potential health benefits.

Garlic has been used since ancient times for a wide variety of purposes. It was used as currency during biblical times, as a food preservative in ancient China and Japan, and as a performance-enhancing aid for Olympic competitors in ancient Greece. And if you're a fan of old horror movies, it also supposedly kept vampires at bay.

Garlic contains sulfur compounds called allyl sulfides, which are believed to be responsible, at least in part, for reducing LDL ("bad") cholesterol and decreasing blood pressure. High LDL cholesterol is considered to be one of the culprits in promoting heart attacks and strokes. But remember that garlic won't make up for an unbalanced diet.

Does this mean we should buy dietary supplements containing these allyl sulfides or other garlic compounds? Despite what the advertisers say, it's probably wiser to get your garlic from the foods you eat than to rely on isolated parts of garlic in a bottle.

And remember, supplements are regulated as foods—not drugs—so the claims on supplement packages aren't tested as drugs are. Most likely there are compounds that scientists have yet to isolate which also are responsible for health benefits.

Chopping or crushing garlic and allowing it to stand for 10 minutes does not reduce potential health benefits according to recent research. Roasting or heating garlic in a microwave oven, however, can inactivate some of garlic's healthful compounds. One thing you definitely shouldn't do with garlic is add it to oil and bottle it to use as a salad dressing or flavored cooking oil. This practice has been linked with cases of botulism, a potentially fatal form of foodborne illness. The garlic-flavored oils sold in grocery stores contain an acid, making these products safe to eat.

Enjoy some garlic and chervil with this week's recipe. A serving of Garlic Shrimp with Chervil contains about 140 calories and 8 grams of fat. But be sure to have a couple of breath mints on hand.

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Sources: Dean Hulse (701) 231-6136 and Julie Garden-Robinson (701) 231-7187

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