The Simple Herb Trick To Give Your Kitchen A Rustic Touch

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If you have an abundance of extra herbs from your garden, you have a few options for preserving them. The paper towel trick for storing herbs in the fridge will give them a longer fresh lifespan, but this can only take your basil and rosemary so far. Alternately, there's a long list of hacks concerning freezing your garden herbs that are very useful. What if we told you, however, that there was a DIY project that could preserve your herbal bounty while also beautifying your kitchen? The secret is a herb drying rack, of which there are several styles to suit your available materials, space, and kitchen decor.

Once you know how to substitute dried for fresh herbs, you will maximize your garden production and make great use of your stash... no more plying the neighbors with bunches of wild mint going crazy in a sunny patch! Even more enticingly, your kitchen will gain a rustic centerpiece that brings a little bit of the outdoors to your indoor cooking space. Some folks utilizing this project will mix wildflowers or pretty greenery among the herbs on their rack for maximum aesthetic effect. Herbs take between five and 10 days to dry out, but this depends on several factors like the temperature, the size of the leaves, and how packed the herb bunches are on the rack. Before too long, you will have delicious dried herbs to cook with. In the meantime, the perfume of their oils will gently scent your space.

Do you want to hang or mount your drying rack? We've seen very attractive and basic racks that use foraged sticks to make a crude ladder that is hung from the ceiling or mounted between cabinets. Bundles of herbs are dangled from the ladder with thin strands of natural jute twine, boosting the rustic look of the project. Or, if you can mount a hook on your ceiling, you can create a very pretty drying rack that's more like a mobile with some wooden embroidery hoops, rope, and tiny clothespins. The rope is knotted around the hoops to make a hanger, and the clothespins are hot-glued around the perimeter to make it easy to hang your herb bundles. This project is slightly more expensive and a little more time-consuming, but also more visually clean and polished than using sticks, if that is the look you seek.

Repurpose a rustic wooden box but using twine and a wooden stick, then hang the bunches of herbs from their stems. You could wall-mount the box or place it on a shelf. You can also make a wall-mounted rack by assembling a rectangular wooden frame and attaching chicken wire to the back. Herbs can be attached to the netting with small clips. Feel free to get creative in constructing your herb drying rack. It need not look perfect... that's the beauty of the rustic vibe. Soon, your kitchen will smell as good as it looks, and you will have all the tasty dried herbs you could ever want!