Nutrition
| Per 100 g | Per 1 oz (28 g) | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 327 kcal | 93 kcal |
| Protein | 5.9 g | 1.7 g |
| Fat | 1.6 g | 0.5 g |
| saturated | 0.4 g | 0.1 g |
| Carbohydrate | 83.5 g | 23.7 g |
| sugars | 0 g | 0 g |
| Fibre | 0 g | 0 g |
| Sodium | 20 mg | 6 mg |
Estimated from the ingredients, for the finished dried product. Actual values vary with the produce you use and how far you dry it.
Ingredients
- 650 g fresh lemongrass
Instructions
- Lemongrass is not a leaf herb and should not be treated as one. What you are drying is a dense, fibrous stalk, so it takes longer than anything else on the herb shelf and it holds on to its water well past the point it looks finished.
- Cut it in the morning once the dew has gone. Every hour of sun on the plant costs a little of the citrus oil that is the entire reason for the exercise.
- Rinse the stalks, shake them off, and leave them on a towel until no water is sitting in the folds. Lemongrass traps water between its layers, so open the cut end and look.
- Trim the root and peel away the papery outer layers. Slice the tender lower stalk into rounds no thicker than 5 mm; keep the tough upper stalk and leaves in finger lengths, because that part is inedible but makes the best of the tea.
- Spread the rounds in one layer with space around each of them, on a mesh insert so nothing small enough drops through. Piled up, the cut faces sit against each other and that is where the moisture is.
- Dry at 40 °C for 6 hours. Halfway in, press a round with a thumbnail: it should snap rather than squash, and a squashy one means the batch is not there yet.
- Take the trays out and let everything reach room temperature before it is jarred. Warm slices carry the last of their moisture with them into the glass.
- Grind the rounds to a powder for curry pastes and rubs, and leave them whole for tea or for anything you intend to fish back out again. Lemongrass gives back about a third of its fresh weight, far more than a leaf would.
- A sealed jar in a dark cupboard holds it for a year, against a fortnight for a fresh stalk in the fridge. Inspect the glass after the first week; any mist means a round was thicker than it looked.
