Home-made Culinary Herbal Oil

This oil is an herbal tradition in our kitchen. Just as soon as the garden starts giving up enough thyme or oregano, it’s time to dry it and get it into an oil.

So let’s make a culinary herb infused olive oil. Ready?

Any dried culinary herbs that you have that you really like, you can do this with. Today, I have oregano, thyme, cayenne, bay, coriander and pepper. A friend of mine grew the cayenne that we’re using. I love it when there’s such an abundance that you can give the garden away!

I make up a bunch of these at once and have them on hand for gifts. For when someone stops by, when we eat at someone’s house, a special thank you gift, birthdays… just about any occasion is right for this culinary oil.

People love this. People use oil. People use olive oil. They use it for salad dressing. They use it for their marinades. They use it to put on top of their food. You can’t go wrong with this gift.

And, homemade gifts are the best! Don’t ya think? If you do have something that you’ve grown, that you can turn into a gift, it’s so satisfying, right?

I love having something to share that’s made with my hands and heart. If you stop by my house, I’ll give you one! I love the abundance of the Earth and it brings me so much joy to share it!

If you aren’t growing your own herbs, you can still do this, just purchase dried herbs and spices to make your culinary oils with.

Now, the thing is you want to make sure of with this oil is that you use dried herbs. Let’s just really establish that. Your herbs need to be dried because if you put fresh or wet herbs in here, things can get moldy.

Get the best organic olive oil you can find and if you look under the resources tab on my website, you will see my rolodex of where you can purchase the bottles.

First you put your herbs in the bottle and then pour the oil in the bottle, easy!

There is no real order to which herbs you put in first. Just get them all into the bottle

Bay leaf

First I’ll add the bay leaf. They’re an amazing digestive aid. Besides adding them to an oil, the other cool thing you can do with your bay leaves is if you have a bag or a jar of rice or beans, you can put a couple dried bay leaves in there to keep the weevils out. Bay leaf helps keep the bugs out that can get into your beans and grains.

Pepper corns

The pepper I add because it’s just one of the best herbs for digestion. I also like to add the pepper for its different color and texture. Your culinary oils look really nice when the herbs you use vary in color, texture and shape.

Thyme

We have lots of garden dried thyme, so in goes the thyme. Thyme is super antibacterial. It’s a really great digestive aide. It’s really good for the lungs and high in nutrition. It’s got iron and magnesium.

Cayenne

The amazing thing about cayenne is not only is it super high in Vitamin C and great for digestion, cayenne adds amazing flavor. It’s not just hot. It’s a really good herb for adding flavor to soups, salad dressings and as a drizzle for humus.

Oregano

Oregano is something that grows all year long in my garden, so that always goes in. Did you know that the name for oregano originates in Greece. Oros means mountain and ganos means joy. So oregano means joy of the mountain. I am glad I have mountain joy in my yard all year!

The cool thing about all the herbs in this oil is they add flavor along with helping you digest your food.

Ok, if you were adding herbs right now, what would you add? What herbs can you dry from your garden or what dried herbs do you have on hand?

There you have it, a beautiful culinary oil that will herbally inspire anyone that you share it with!