We cook a lot with lavender. It’s a fun herb to experiment with due to its uncommon nature. Unlike rosemary or garlic, it’s not something most people know how to cook with. The idea of using lavender in savoury dishes often weirds people out. But, some of lavender’s most delicious uses are in savoury recipes!
TLC Savoury Herb Blend
Lavender goes surprisingly well with meat. It’s herbaceous nature shines through and adds sweetness without actually adding any. If that makes some sense? So, when my family asked us to create a small batch of lavender rub for their Blue Sky Beef customers, we were very happy to mix something up.
The final blend for Blue Sky Beef featured a combination of ground lavender, rosemary and thyme, with a bit of salt, garlic and pepper. Simple, flavourful and lavender-forward.
Once we had the recipe, we realized we should make more of it! Lots of you want to try culinary lavender, but just aren’t sure where to start. So, our hope is that this blend will take some of the guessing out and show you how you can use lavender in savoury dishes.
The blend features Lavandula angustifolia “Hidcote Blue” lavender grown and dried on our farm. It’s a good fit because Hidcote Blue has a “peppery” quality to it in my opinion. Plus, it has a great blueish purple hue.
We think the blend goes especially well on beef, potatoes and in bread, but it can be used on chicken, turkey, pork, in stuffing, creamed into butter or cheese and in soups or stews.
Tip: Not sure if lavender will work with the flavours of your recipe? A good rule of thumb is, “if rosemary works, lavender will too”.
Test Batch No. 1
We’re calling our first iteration of the Savoury Herb Blend a test batch. Despite all our planning, we had an aesthetic mishap. When we mixed up the blend for retail, the final addition of garlic powder when awry. It was too finely ground and instead of incorporating into the blend, it coated everything.
So, Test Batch No. 1 is seriously delicious, just doesn’t look perfect. And since we know people eat with their eyes, we’ve discounted the price to encourage you to try it and hopefully give us some feedback on the blend.
Too much lavender? Not enough? What recipe did you use it in? We know we need to remedy the garlic powder, but is there anything else you think we should tweak?
Pop your thoughts in the comments section below. Or send us an email at tullamorelavender@gmail.com
Xo, Stephanie