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How to dry fresh basil from your garden or purchased at the store to preserve nutrients and flavor for all your cooking needs.
I had a large amount of fresh basil from my herbal garden window this season, so I thought I would share how I dried the fresh sprigs I didn’t use right away to preserve them for later use.
Like many herbs, basil is originally native to India.
It is probably best known, though, as a culinary herb used pervasively throughout Italian cuisine.
Let me just tell you that using your own fresh and dried basil and others such as freshly dried oregano really makes the flavor pop!
Here are just a few of the dishes where I use it.
- Easy pizza sauce recipe
- Homemade red sauce recipe
- Coconut flour pizza crust
- Sprouted flour pizza crust
- Almond flour pizza crust
- Breakfast pizza recipe
- Gluten free pizza crust recipe
Homemade Dried Basil
I decided to make dried basil so that I would have it available all year until I grow it again next season.Â
It was a bit intimidating at first as I had never dried herbs before.
As it turns out, it is quite easy to do!
This process is important to know for those who buy fresh herbs from the store too.
Instead of tossing the sprigs that you don’t use, why not dry them instead?
5 Steps to Dry Fresh Basil
Follow these easy steps and your fresh basil sprigs will be ready for drying in less than 10 minutes.
- Snip the basil sprigs off the main plant before it flowers. No worries if yours is already flowering, just be aware that your basil may not be quite as full flavored.
- Remove all the leaves from the stems. I like to do this by hand rather than by cutting. Discard or compost the stems.
- Chop the basil leaves into small pieces. Take care not to chop too small. I do not rinse my basil leaves as I want to preserve any natural lactobacilli and beneficial yeasts on the leaves.
- Place the basil pieces on a white, nonbleached cotton towel.  Flour sack cloths or tea towels work great.
- Put the towel in a place where it won’t be disturbed for a few days away from heat and light but with plenty of air circulation.
Process and Store
Once the basil is dry after a few days, you will notice that it retains its beautiful green color.
It doesn’t turn brown like it would if you tied up the basil in bunches and hung it upside down.
Place the dried basil pieces in a food processor and pulse a few times to chop into very small pieces if desired.
Store dried basil in an airtight container in a cupboard.
Glass will retain the flavor the best. This article on how to properly store bulk herbs gives other tips on how to best preserve potency.
Dried basil and other home-dried herbs are best used within a year.
How easy is that? Do you have special tips for drying basil or other herbs?
My basil isn’t growing well this year at all! I hope it reseeds itself and does better next year…
Love drying my herbs and raspberry leaves, I use the dehydrator and a drying rack. I feel so happy to use the herbs from my yard instead of buying them.
I use my dehydrator around 115. This dries it nicely too. I dried a lot of herbs this year! Basil is my most frequently used, I go through a couple quart jars full of dried basil every year. I hear it grows well among tomato plants. A friend did this and had so much she brought me some.
I find that my own dried basil is soooo much better than store bought! 🙂 And way cheaper, lol
I find that my own dried basil is soooo much better than store bought! 🙂 And way cheaper, lol
I usually just make pesto and freeze that. But I am interested in learning how to save hot peppers. Can I freeze them or dry them? I would want them to be used in recipes such as chili in the winter. Any suggestions?
I just hang mine up in small groups, with twine wrapped around the stems. It takes a while for them to dry this way, but they are fabulous in a pot of chili. A dehydrator would work as well. I store them in glass jars once they’re dried.
I do think frozen basil has more flavor. But I still like to keep a lot of it dried on hand as well. And the flavor is MUCH better than store-bought dried. However, it is best to leave the leaves whole after drying them, until right before you use it. If you chop it or crumble it and then let it sit, it loses a lot of flavor.
Homedried basil is SO much more flavorful, I agree. I am shocked by the difference. It makes sense when you think about it, though. Who knows how long is that organic basil been sitting on the store shelf?
Drying basil is said to diminish flavor from using fresh, so freezing is a preferred method. One way I preserve basil is this: I process in the food processor with olive oil until it forms a paste, the I scoop into ice cube trays and freeze. Once frozen, I pop them out and put them in freezer bags. It’s like half-finished pesto, and often I take out a couple of cubes {per person served}, thaw them, and add them to pasta, Chinese dumplings, or whatever. If I am making pesto, I thaw them and then finish the pesto, as this retains the greatest flavor of the pesto {versus freezing it as pesto}.
Sarah: You mentioned harvesting before it flowers, but I take it one giant step further ~ you may too, but didn’t say, so I want to share it with everyone: Nip the developing flower buds from the plant as you see them, as the leaves start to become bitter as the plant protects itself for flowering. Then, snip off stems at leaf junctions. You want to snip just above a junction so that the remaining plant is sending energy to leaf development and not a bare stem which will only deplete energy that could be used elsewhere. Also, if the stem is wide enough, snip at a downward-sloping angle so rain and dew don’t collect on the cut and cause rot. Anyhoo, when you ‘prune’ the plant in this way, you can continue to harvest for a lot longer. I have already harvested three times from my basil plants, and am harvesting again today. Pesto all winter!!!
Thanks for these great tips Karin! 🙂
I’ll be doing this over the next couple of days! We didn’t have a ton of basil this year, some, but not tons. Our sage really went nuts, though, and we still have lots of rosemary! Thanks, Sarah!
Love herbs, but especially basil! One of my all time favorite herbs! (c: