Growing up, we didn’t eat at a lot of fancy restaurants. But the somewhat fancy places tended to include a sprig of fresh parsley on some salads and sides. Class!
You don’t see that very often now. When did it disappear? Was the parsley supposed to cleanse the palate or freshen the breath? Apart from pickled ginger or the mukhwas mouth freshener after good Indian, does anything else commonly serve this purpose?
I remember parsley garnishes but I always placed them to the side and never consumed them.
If I recall my parents used to say it was simply decorative.
It is mainly decorative but it is edible.
This was 50 or more years ago. I don’t think I ever tried eating it even after I became an adult.
I always thought it was just a garnish, but at some point in my childhood my mother learned that it is also a good breath-freshener. After that, we’d sporadically consume the parsley after finishing the rest of the meal.
My mother always ate the parsley. I can’t remember whether my father did. I also can’t remember whether I ate it as a child; but I definitely eat it now, if offered any. And sometimes I put some on a sandwich, almost as if it were lettuce (though not usually as much as I would lettuce, at least if there’s plenty of lettuce.)
I love parsley. I grow it, and take a couple of sprigs for soup and stuff. And sometimes i just pluck a sprig and eat it
I like parsley, too. I love a good pasta with heaping handsful of chopped parsley. Yum.
^ And this is how I use it at home.
I suspect the sprigs at restaurants became a thing of the past due to it basically being a waste item, as hardly anyone would eat it. Why spend the money on it?
Two dollars today buys you a lot; enough for a hundred plates. I think it just went out of fashion, not mainly due to the minimal cost. Dad always said it freshened the breath (though not always his).
It was a marker of fine dining. Like serving “After Eight” dinner mints (waffer thin!) with the bill. Or having a bowl of mints by the door that tasted like toothpaste. Or putting frilly toothpicks in triangular club sandwiches.
I wish I liked parsley that well! I have no objection to it when chopped and added to a dish; it’s mostly neutral and maybe a little nice fresh green taste. But I can’t say I like eating a fresh sprig straight up; the texture is … intrusive … and it doesn’t offer the aromatic hit you get from fresh basil or mint; it just tastes to me like grass. Please send me a few of your more discerning, educated taste buds.
When my sister and I were kids, we grew parsley in the back yard. It’s amazingly easy to grow, and will grow all summer long. Every ten days or so, we’d pick a few bunches, and sell them to the local butcher and the greengrocer, and any neighbours who wanted any. I don’t think we made more than two dollars per “harvest,” but there were a number of harvests per summer. Sis and I always had plenty to spend at the corner store those summers.
What?
We have parsley growing in our herb garden. I use it as an ingredient or garnish most evenings.
I had no idea parsley went back that far/s.
The finishing touch of a sprig of parsley (or some other finishing detail) can be important in getting the whole of the presentation right, in my experience; if you are plating with the intention and knowlege of how it will be finished, the whole of the arrangement becomes easier to care about. Maybe that’s just me, but I notice that if I prepare a garnish for the final flourish, I present my food with more care.
Yes! I’ve made some mediocre meals that got ohhhs and ahhhs because of the plating and presentation.
As an old chef said to me, “First we taste with the eyes”.
How true.
Interesting. Parsley to me has quite a distinctive flavor.
I wonder whether it’s the tastebuds or the parsley? I’m growing varieties that are bred for (among other things) the flavor; maybe there are some bland ones on the market? Might be the tastebuds, though; they do indeed vary.