3 Cheers for Chives

Chives are a popular and easy herb to grow in the garden or in containers in your kitchen. The delicate savor of onion in chopped chives is commonly combined with sour cream and cream cheese or sprinkled over dishes as a mild garnish. Garlic or Chinese chives are a more pungent relative with slightly taller, broader leaves and an unmistakable garlic note in their taste. Members of the Allium family, chives are perennials, sprouting new shoots every spring. They are fairly cold hardy; I can usually find my clumps of chives green and thriving from early March until a hard freeze in December. Right now little pinkish purple puffs of flowers are blooming from my chive clump. I like to snip them for small onion scented bouquets leaving a few outside for the bees and for later seed. Garlic chives flower later, taller in loose white fireworks forms.

Chives are best freshly picked. Personally, I love covering a bagel with cream cheese and chives, chopping a bunch to go over boiled potatoes or in potato salad or sprinkling them over a cheesy omelet. Making chive butter to freeze is a great way to store chives or other herbs that don't taste the same dried.

Chive Butter

1 stick butter (8Tbsp)
3-4 Tbsp chopped chives

Let butter sit at room temperature until soft and easy to work. Mix with herbs in a small bowl until well blended. Spoon onto wax paper and remold into a stick shape. Wrap tightly and freeze. Garlic and dill are also fabulous to use for an herb butter!

Add a tablespoon or two of chive butter to the pan before frying fish or to start a simple sauce. A little herbed butter melted and tossed with steamed vegetables is truly delightful.