What does lovage taste like?
Lovage is mainly grown for its leaves, which taste rather like celery, but sweeter, with a hint of parsley and aniseed. Or add them, chopped, to salads or stuffings for pork or chicken, or to fish chowder, or to just-boiled new potatoes in a mustardy vinaigrette. Lovage is delicious with eggs, too – stir leaves into omelettes, scrambled egg or frittata.The seeds and seed oil are used for flavouring agents in confectionery and liqueurs. As a medicinal plant, lovage has been used as a digestive, carminative, diaphoretic, diuretic, emmenagogue, anti-dyspeptic, expectorant, stimulant and stomachic; and also as a treatment for jaundice.Today, lovage is commonly used in the dishes of European Cuisine. Even though true lovage is a native of Southern Europe, it is widely cultivated in countries such as Germany, Poland, Hungary, France, Czech, Italy, the United States as well as western Asia.The delicate leaves of lovage appear like celery leaves and smell the same. The leaves have a strong flavor and aroma. In fact, only a few leaves of lovage are needed to flavor your dish. Lovage seeds and leaves are a common flavoring ingredient in several European cuisines.
Is lovage safe to eat?
Fresh leaves can be used in soups or salads or to flavor dishes. Around the world, lovage is commonly used as a spice when cooking. The extracts from lovage have also been used as flavoring additives in food. These extracts are considered generally safe. The name “lovage” comes from “love-ache”, which was the traditional name for parsley in Medieval times. This plant tastes of both celery and parsley. However, its celery taste is stronger in some varieties.Lovage belongs to the Apiaceae family. Its soft green foliage resembles that of celery, as are its flavour and, but with a slight pepperiness. It can be used in addition to – or even instead of – celery in most recipes, though sparingly since its flavour is much more pronounced than its cousin.According to folklore tales, its pungent aroma and bright green leaves (green being connected to the heart chakra) was said to stir feelings of romance. Lovage has also been traditionally used as an aphrodisiac, as the herb has an affinity for reproductive health.Also known as sea parsley, the leaves and stem of the lovage plant add an intense celery-like flavour to soups, stews and stocks or pork and poultry dishes. It can also be used to enhance the flavour of potato dishes.Substitutions for Lovage While nothing will give you quite the same punch as lovage, a combination of celery, parsley, and celery seed (perhaps with a bit of lemon zest) will put you in the same ballpark. You might also try a bit of celeriac (another woefully underused root) to achieve that intense celery flavor.
Is lovage the same as parsley?
Lovage is an umbellifer, a visual cross between rhubarb, celery and parsley, its hollow stems showered with pale greeny-yellow flowers, similar to fennel’s, in mid spring. Lovage, affectionately nicknamed Maggi Herb, is a perennial aromatic plant from the Apiaceae family, with the botanical name Levisticum officinale.It’s a superfood) The little-known herb lovage is one of the top 20 health foods, according to the authors of The Sirtfood Diet, a convincing new book about optimum nutrition for health and weight loss. Lovage is rich in quercetin, a potent antioxidant with an array of health benefits.
What is lovage used for?
This perennial plant can be grown for landscaping or cooking. The leaves of the lovage plant can be used fresh or dried. Fresh leaves can be used in soups or salads or to flavor dishes. Around the world, lovage is commonly used as a spice when cooking. Lovage has long been used in traditional medicine, particularly as carminative, digestive, diuretic, expectorant, antispasmodic and diaphoretic. In Iranian folk medicine, lovage is used for the treatment of several gastrointestinal, nervous and rheumatic disorders.Overall, lovage is recognised to have very few significant adverse effects. The FDA states that it is a natural flavouring herb. It can be used both in the appropriate forms and in the minimum quantity required to produce [its] intended physical or technical effect.