Drying parsley

Each fall, I harvest and dry my oregano.   This past year, I had some extra basil and dried that too.  I bought 10 bottles from a thrift store for 50 cents each and used some labels and chalk to dress them up before giving them away.  Fresh dried herbs are the best!  You know where they come from and they aren't dust....you can actually see the leaves.

The other day, I noticed that my flat leaf parsley was out of control....in a beautiful way. I cook with parsley but there was no way I could use all this.   I didn't want to waste it or let it go to bloom so I decided it was time for a hair cut.   I can always use more dried parsley!  

Here is how I dry my herbs....

First whack them and shake them HARD to get rid of anything creepy crawly on them.   Pull out anything not pretty.  Using about 18 inches of kitchen twine, tie them in smallish bundles upside down.  I use a slip knot.  
After knotting,run the twine through a branch below the knot.  That way, as it dries, the stems won't fall out of the slip knot.

Then stuff them leaf side down into brown paper lunch bags, let the twine hang out of the bag and clip the bag closed.  I clip mine closed right by the stems.  Don't overfill the bags or you run the risk of getting mold.

You can do this step without the bags but I like to use the bags because it catches anything that dries and falls off.  Sometimes I let them dry a few days without the bags and then add them later.

Then tie them to the rail in the wash room.  I use a slip knot here too.  This room gets hot and dry.  Perfect for drying herbs and letting bread dough rise!

Now all I have to do is let time do the work.  Once dried, I can strip the stems and put the parsley into the bottles I have.