How to Dry Lovage Herb

Learn how to dry Lovage, a herb that tastes like celery.

We have perennial Lovage growing in the garden, so every year we get to enjoy big harvests of the leaves. We use them fresh in cooking, but we also dry this Mediterranean herb to use in the winter. Here’s my method for drying Lovage for use all year long.

If you want to learn more about growing Lovage plants and the care it needs, you can find it here at Growing Lovage in the Herb Garden.

How to Dry Lovage

This is lovage. It tastes a lot like celery but with a stronger flavor. It’s great to use in soups, salads, stews or on top of baked potatoes. Add it to oven roasted chicken or crumble some on top of steamed fresh garden carrots. Use it as an ingredients in any type of cuisine you would use celery in.

You can see it grows quite tall and if it gets too large for its spot, you can divide it in the Fall and end up with two plants.

Lovage likes to grow in full sun, like here although it will grow well in part shade as well. The northern zones are where this plant loves to be and it has a long growing season.

Since it grows quite large, you can easily give it a really good trimming in late Spring. All these leaves are the new growth! Just cut the stems down low on the plant. You will have lots of Lovage to dry for future use and the plant will still be a good size.

Tip: Start harvesting the leaves early in the year. At some point in the season, you will see a seed head flower start to emerge. I always cut the plants flower off; I find that the leaves take on a different taste once the plant tries to flower.

 

A basket full of just picked Lovage. Oh it smells so wonderful and look at all those large leaves. I will dry all of the leaves and then pick some more. That’s how much Lovage we can use in a year. We use it often and I never want to find my herb jars empty come February!

What Size Bowls or Baskets to Use to Dry Lovage

 

I often start drying the lovage leaves by snipping them from the stalks into shallow bowls. I let them sit on top of the woodstove and rustle them with my fingers several times a day. We don’t use the woodstove while drying the herbs.

Our stove doesn’t get used during the summer months at all. It just becomes a safe spot where I can keep my herb dishes!

It doesn’t take long until the herbs are dry. When they are, I just put them in individual glass jars, using quart sized mason jars for the larger quantities. I use pint size jars and even half pints for the herbs I only store a small amount of. The bowl in the upper left is basil, and the rest is lovage.

 

Many herbs can easily be dried like this in shallow baskets or bowls, including parsley, thyme, rosemary, sage, oregano and others. 

Instead of using baskets, you could air dry them by gathering them in bunches, then hang them upside down out of the way. Or hang them in a paper bag if you are concerned about dust or pet hair.

Many people use a dehydrator to preserve their herbs although we do have (and use) a dehydrator here, we usually dry our herbs using this open air method. 

Have you tried drying your own herbs? It’s easy to do and they make everything taste so much better, it’s worth a try to start using more herbs on a daily basis.

Other Herbs We Grow

The leaves from a Bay Laurel are also easy to dehydrate – bay leaves are used often in soups or stews. They add a wonderful flavour; just be sure to remove the leaves before serving your dish! Here is how to dry Bay Laurel leaves for using all year long.

 

 

I grow Basil every year. It has such a strong flavour I find not much is needed to add some awesome flavour to dinners. But I don’t dry my Basil – I found a special trick that really works. Preserving Basil this way really keeps that strong flavour. When you dry herbs, some flavour is always lost – another instance where “fresh is best”.

Here’s how to preserve Basil and keep that strong flavour – it’s a simple, fast and super easy way to preserve a lot of Basil in a short amount of time! Want to find out how to dry Parsley?

I’ve yet to try using herbs in a salt but this one sounds delicious. It calls for Basil to be used in this Herb Infused Cooking Salt.

How to Dry Lovage

 

Originally published Aug 2017; latest update Oct 2024