It seems there’s no way to buy or grow a small, or even medium amount of basil. It usually comes in huge plastic tubs, and a healthy plant can produce more than you know what to do with. You can get pretty far with pesto and caprese salads, but not everyone is a fan of repeat performances. If you’ve already eaten your fill of the most common basil applications, try expanding your repertoire with one of these.
Blend it into mayonnaise
This is particularly useful if your basil is starting to look a little tired. Even the saddest, most pathetic looking herbs taste good when blended into mayo and spread on a sandwich. As I’ve mentioned previously, it’s versatile without being involved:
Aim for a ratio of one cup of mayonnaise for every cup of roughly chopped herbs and alliums. Wash the plant parts by swishing them around in a bowl of water, pat them dry with paper towels, and blend them with the mayo using a food processor, immersion blender, or “regular” blender until you have a green, super herby, fresh but still very creamy sauce. It’s very good as-is—spread it on a sandwich!—but you can also thin it out with a little red wine vinegar to make a salad dressing (add a pinch of sugar as well), or mix it into sour cream to make a more substantial chip dip. It’s also friendly to potatoes of all kinds: it’s delicious drizzled on roasted potatoes or whipped it into a mash, and it makes a superb french fry dipping sauce.
Shake up a cocktail
Photo: Claire Lower
Besides being pretty and delicious, this cocktail is helpful, useful even. Rather than using a leaf or two as a garnish, this recipe calls for 10 leaves per cocktail, plus more for garnishing. Besides basil, all you need is gin and lemonade:
Add the 10 fresh basil leaves to a shaker and muddle into oblivion. Add 2 ounces gin, 1 1/2 ounces lemonade, and ice, and shake until well chilled. Strain through a fine mesh sieve over a big rock, and garnish with a couple of basil leaves.
Make a simple herb oil
It’s not so much that I tire of pesto; I tire of making it, and of purchasing the other, non-basil ingredients required to make it. This herb oil is loosely based on Julia Turshen’s green sauce, only there are no measurements, no ratios, no rules:
Add handfuls of herbs to a food processor or blender, along with a garlic clove if you desire such, and pulse until they are pretty well pulverized. Add a pinch of salt and then, with the motor running and the blades whirring, drizzle in olive oil until you get the consistency you’re looking for, be it spreadable or pourable. Taste your oil and season more if needed.
Drizzle on eggs for a vibrant, summery breakfast.
Add it to any salad
Caprese is not the only salad that benefits from basil. Green salads—the leaf-based ones—are usually made with somewhat bland leaves; basil is also a leaf, but a leaf with far more flavor than romaine. By supplementing your bowl of standard leaves with handfuls of more exciting leaves, you get a better tasting salad without the need for more dressing. Prep-wise, you need to do very little:
Prep-wise, I like to leave small leaves whole, and chiffonade any larger ones. Toss them with the lettuce to ensure even distribution; you want an herb in every bite. Then—and only then—should you add your salty bits, your cheesy crumbles, and your dressing. I think you’ll find you need less of each, though “need” is a funny word, especially when it comes to cheese.
Make a simple syrup
Cocktail syrups are worth making, even if you don’t drink cocktails. You can use them to flavor nonalcoholic beverages, drizzle them on cake, or stir them into sauces. Basil simple syrup works in all of these applications. (Add a little to your next marinara if you don’t believe me, but do not tell the Italians.)
To make it, add 1 cup of basil leaves, 1 cup of sugar, and 1 cup of water to a pot or sauce pan. Bring to a boil and stir until the sugar dissolves, then cover and remove from the heat, and allow the syrup to steep for 30 minutes. Strain and cool. Basil syrup will keep in the fridge for one month.
Make ice cream
This ice cream recipe from Katie Quinn combines vibrant basil with salty cream cheese and a little sweet cream for a complex and refreshing frozen treat. Learn how to make it on YouTube.
Freshen your car
I don’t know what your car smells like, but mine is less than fresh. Rather than hanging an overly potent cardboard tree from your rearview mirror, you can obscure unwanted aromas with fresh basil leaves:
...freshen your car by putting some fresh basil leaves on a piece of newspaper and just letting it dry itself out in the back of your car. The windows make it a natural greenhouse, so as the basil dries, the delicious smell will spread through your vehicle.
Depending on how many vehicles you own (and how stinky its passengers are), you could go through a lot of basil this way.
