Culinary herbs are so useful to enrich meals. So are condiments! ...So why don't I combine both and make my herbal condiments, that are so flavorful and has medicinal benefits at the same time. Mayonnaise is such a useful condiment in our kitchen, and ...who doesn't like Mayo!?
Dina Falconi, herbalist in upstate NY, has a great herbal recipe book "FORAGING & FEASTING: A Field Guide and Wild Food Cookbook". I apply her recipe on my mayonnaise with herbs of my pick.
I like bitter as a flavor. Because bitters have a lot of benefits; bitters promote saliva and bile production, bitters are hepatic, overall they are great digestive aids! ...So my pick is parsley and a bit of thyme this time. I'd like to share the benefits from ingesting parsley.
Parsley has been treated as just a garnish on plates while it can deliver so much more to us. Parsley can provide...
•Anti-Oxidant property: Beta carotene, an antioxidant, can protect our cells from free-radicals.
•Bone health improvement: Excellent source of Vitamin K which is closely related to bone health.
•Anti-cancer property: Myricetin, a flavonol, in parsley has been shown to be effective on chemopreventive. Also chlorophyll is a compound that can support blocking carcinogenic affect from overly burnt from animal meat.
•Diuretic property: That means parsley can flush things out of the body. Very detoxifing. Its diuretic action can be well used for urinary tract infections, kidney stone, and gallbladder stone. Edema can be alleviated as well.
*Roots are more diuretic than leaves + stems
Also, parsley is high in Vitamin C, has numerous benefits in our overall health, and minerals (iron, magnesium, phosphorous, zinc, potassium, and copper).
Here in recipe, I used Garlic as well. Garlic alone can give us so many therapeutic action along with great accent and flavor on foods. Known to have a great deal of actions, such as anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial, hypotensive, lowering cholesterol... Here is the important fact to take advantage of those actions, that is... to crash, chopped, or slice raw garlic cloves and leave them for 10 min. before cooking! Allicin is the compound giving us all those benefits. Garlic clove itself doesn't contain Allicin. Alliin (compound) and alliinase (enzyme) are in its cell separately. By chopping it up and break the cell structure, those two can react to each other and create Allicin. We need to let this magic happen by giving some time.
Here are what you prepare... Please remember that quality matters here.
• 2 fresh good quality egg yolks
• 1 tbsp of lemon or lime juice
• 1 tbsp of vinegar
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 0.5 tsp of sea salt
• 1 cup of oil (good quality olive oil is perfect. cold pressed, organic)
• 3~8 tbsp of 1~2 kinds of fresh herbs you like (It's a suggested dosage, but I'd say you can over-do herbs!)
I personally like mayonnaise to be vinegarish than creamy. So I'd bump up the amount of lemon or lime juice and/or vinegar than Dina's recipe. Also if you want mayonnaise to be light, you can add egg white.
1. Egg yolks in food processor and mix for 30 sec.
2. Add lemon juice, vinegar, and salt and mix for 15 sec.
3. Pour oil slowly and mix 3~4 min. until it creates an emulsion.
4. Place the mayonnaise in the clean glass jar and store in the fridge. It'll be flavorful for 2 month.