Move Over, Parsley

Lets not make dining at the resort the automatic choice.

What's the automatic response to feeding a sick child?: in the west, it'll be chicken soup; while it's porridge in the far east. Such an automatic response has grown within my very being an aversion to porridge of all sorts, however tasty it might be, when I'm fit and healthy.

Such an unthinking culinary response may be said to a choice of garnish: it'll be fresh sprigs of flat leaf parsley in the west or middle east, and slivers of sprite green spring onions over steamed fish, whole or fillet, in the far east. And that makes me think that the choice of colour dominates this auto-response as very frankly speaking, parsley doesn't enhance the flavour of a tomato-based pasta sauce much. And the spring onions are always pushed aside so that diners can get to the hearty chunks of fish beneath.  

And though we feast first with our eyes, letting colour dominate our choice of garnish short changes our diners' culinary experience, as the parsley and spring onions add little to the flavour of the dish. So what would influence our choice of garnish if we think of taste and colour?

Well, I'll sprinkle fresh thyme or tarragon leaves over the pasta sauce, offering an enhanced contrast to the tomato-flavours of the gravy. And I'll generously add depth and potency to ocean fresh mussels steamed in a tomato passata by stirring in heaps of coriander leaves picked the very last minute from my garden. And also  serve this tasty oriental herb up with chunks of steamed fish fillet onto my guests' dinner plate.

And the choice of substitutes are as endless as there are a choice of garden-green herbs. The trick is to remember to balance the dominate taste of your mains with the herb you add. The taste of the herb must enhance rather than distract. Then your choice complexes the flavours of your dish.