A bunch of parsley lasts five days in the fridge before it starts to yellow. Ground into coarse sea salt, that same bunch keeps for six months without the aroma turning. This is not nostalgia from grandma’s larder, it is simple food chemistry: salt draws out moisture, and without moisture there is no spoilage.
We have been making our herb salt for years in two versions. The quick version uses dried herbs from the cupboard and is ready in ten minutes. The summer version uses 300 g of fresh herbs from the garden, which we pre-dry in the oven at 50 °C for one hour before they go into the mixing bowl. Both end up in screw-top jars and stand within easy reach next to the pepper mill and olive oil all year round.
Herb Salt with the Thermomix®
Ingredients 0 / 8 ✓
- 1 tbsp dried wild garlic
- 2 tbsp dried parsley
- 1 tbsp dried thyme
- 1 tbsp dried marjoram
- 1/2 tbsp dried oregano
- 1/2 tbsp dried rosemary
- 1 tsp chilli flakes optional
- 250 g sea salt coarse
Instructions 0 / 3
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1
Grind.
Add all ingredients to the mixing bowl, grind for 10 sec / speed 10 and push down with the spatula.
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2
Refine.
If it is not yet fine enough, grind for a further 5 sec / speed 10.
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3
Fill.
Fill the herb salt into a clean screw-top jar and seal airtight. Prepared this way, the herb salt keeps for several years.
Tip: The chilli flakes give the salt a mild heat.
Video
Nutrition per serving
Why 250 g of salt to just a few tablespoons of herbs
The ratio in the basic recipe looks unbalanced at first glance. 250 g of coarse sea salt, plus around 7 tbsp of herbs and 1 tsp of chilli flakes. The logic behind it: the salt here is not just a seasoning but a preservative. It draws every trace of free moisture out of the mixture, and that is exactly why the jar keeps for six months without anything going mouldy or musty. If you reverse the ratio and use more herbs than salt, you get a lovely green mixture that shows mould spots by April.
The Thermomix® is the right tool for this step because it pulverises the herbs and salt at one speed setting: 10 seconds at speed 10, push down once with the spatula, then refine with 5 seconds at speed 10 if needed. Two things happen at once. The salt crystals break open the herb cells and release the essential oils, while the salt surfaces bind the aromatic compounds. In a mortar this takes twenty minutes and never turns out as even.
Fresh herbs need a drying step first
The most common question about this recipe is about fresh herbs from the garden. The answer: they work, but only with an extra drying step. We harvest 300 g before flowering, pick off the leaves, wash them in cold water and shake them dry in a tea towel. Then they go onto a baking tray lined with baking paper in the oven. 50 °C fan, one hour, door left slightly ajar so the moisture can escape. Using 60 °C risks brown edges and lost essential oils. Skipping the drying step and grinding the damp leaves straight with salt gives you a green paste that shows mould spots within three weeks.
After drying, the home-dried herbs replace the dried herbs in the basic recipe. The grinding process is identical and the ratio of salt to herbs stays the same. We use 40 g of coarse salt to 300 g of fresh herbs for the drying step itself, then grind the dried mixture with the remaining 210 g of salt from the recipe.
Three blends, three characters
We share three recipes in this post. The classic blend with wild garlic, parsley, thyme, marjoram, oregano, rosemary and chilli flakes goes with almost everything: roasted vegetables, pan-fried potatoes, salad dressings, tomato soup. The garlic version uses one fresh garlic clove, chopped for 3 sec / speed 8 and then combined with 150 g of salt and herbs. It tastes noticeably rounder than any garlic granule mix from the supermarket, because the fresh allicin is released during grinding.
The Mediterranean herb salt is our favourite blend for pasta, pizza and Bruschetta. 4 tsp rosemary, 4 tsp basil, 2 tsp each of oregano, thyme and marjoram, plus one garlic clove and 150 g of coarse salt. This is the blend to reach for when you want a taste of Italy in a jar. It keeps for around four to five months, a little shorter than the classic version, because the proportion of basil is high and basil loses its aroma faster than rosemary or thyme.
What really happens during storage
Three things determine shelf life: how dry the herbs are, how airtight the jar is, and protection from light. We fill straight into clean screw-top jars after grinding, press the salt down lightly with a dry spoon and seal immediately. Our jars stand on a kitchen shelf, not on the windowsill. Sunlight bleaches the green colour within eight weeks, and the flavour follows later.
If the salt clumps after two weeks, one of the herbs was not fully dried. That is not a disaster. We place the open jar in the oven at 50 °C for one hour, leave it to cool and seal it again. The flavour is unaffected and the clumping usually disappears. Mould spots (grey, blue, black) are a different matter. That is a stop signal and the jar must go. Mould in salt is rare, but it does happen when the herbs were too damp.
Where herb salt really earns its place
We use our herb salt in places where plain salt would be one-dimensional. Over jacket potatoes just before serving, because the heat opens up the essential oils immediately. In potato soup made with the Thermomix®, once the soup is already creamy and just needs a final seasoning note. On tomatoes with Mozzarella, a splash of olive oil and nothing else. In a salad dressing together with mustard, vinegar and oil, instead of salt and a separate herb mix. On grilled meat directly after turning, never before, because salt draws out the juices and the herbs would burn on the grill.
Filled into small screw-top jars with a handwritten label, herb salt also makes a gift that feels far more personal than a bottle of wine. For a larger quantity we simply scale up the basic recipe and fill from the mixing bowl into several 90 ml jars. One batch makes four to five gifts.
6 months sealed and kept in the dark
In a sealed screw-top jar, kept in the dark at room temperature, the classic herb salt stays aromatic for six months. The Mediterranean blend with its high basil content lasts around four to five months, after which the flavour fades a little but it is still usable. Older herb salt that no longer seems quite fresh goes into stocks and braises, where the loss of aroma is not noticeable.
We have gathered more basic recipes for the Thermomix® in our basic recipes collection.
Goes well with: Pasta.
Goes well with: Lemon Salt Paste, Thermomix®.
Freezing is neither necessary nor sensible. Salt draws moisture from the surroundings in the freezer as soon as the jar is opened, and then clumps irreversibly. Dry storage is the right method.
