"David Hare-Scott" wrote in message
news

"Andrew Ostrander" wrote in message
...
I think you are off-base on tarragon. Dried tarragon has little
flavour but
freezing it works, and so does making tarragon vinegar. As for your
remark
about cultivars of tarragon, I understand that French tarragon doesn't
set
seed, so all the tarragon plants in the world are clones, and
therefore the
same strain.

(Russian tarragon is a different herb, inferior in for cuisinary use.)


Perhaps our differences are a case of international variation in
material available and conditions. I have found store-bought dried
tarragon to be very flavoursome most of the time and I cook with it
quite a bit. I suspect the stuff that wasn't good was old stock or was
not stored properly, perhaps that has been your problem.

I wonder about the provenence of the "French" tarragon around the world,
it would be interesting to see if the material in various countries
could be traced back to some one ancestral source or if the non-seeding
variety has arisen more than once in history. I don't know how you do
such a study short of DNA analysis.

I have found considerable variation in the flavour of fresh tarragon.
Was this because of different cultivars of French tarragon or was it due
to confusion of French and Russian varieties (some nurseries don't seem
to know that there are two sorts and I cannot tell the difference by
sight) or variations in growing conditions and seasonal effects? I
don't know. Now that I have more time and space for gardening perhaps I
will conduct a grand tarragon study - win, lose or draw it would be fun
(yum!).

David

Russian tarragon is often available because it is grown from seed and is
tasteless. I have found that nurseries don't know the difference and sell
the Russian as the real thing and most of them buy the seedlings from
wholesalers anyway. Even seed companies sell the seeds as a culinary herb.
OTOH French tarragon can only be propagated from splitting rootstock, which
is best done in spring. I would imagine that growing conditions might
contribute to flavour variations as well as different cultivars. Mine is
quite strong. Ahhh, the smell in the kitchen of tarragon chicken
cooking........

Graham