Fresh herbs are wonderful to cook with (and sometimes to bake with), but they have a couple of shortcomings. One is that they’re sold in large bunches, so you have to find ways of keeping them fresh and storing the leftovers. A more immediate issue is that stripping the flavorful leaves from the tough stems…
The Box Grater Hack for Fresh Herbs
Commercial herb strippers are simple metal or plastic plates with different-sized holes in them. You insert the herb’s stem into a suitable-sized hole, pull it through, and the leaves remain. Conveniently, your box grater’s sides are also filled with holes, each with a sharp cutting edge to strip away the leaves.
So, how does it work? It’s pretty simple.
1. Choose the side of your grater with holes that match the size of the herb you’re stripping (large or medium for rosemary, small for thyme, etc.).
2. Insert the stem end of the herb through a hole, starting from the outside.
3. Using your fingers, locate the stem inside the box grater and gently pull it through the hole.
If you’ve chosen the right-sized hole, the leaves will drop onto your work surface and you’ll be left with a mostly bare stem. This hack works best when the herb has a reasonably sturdy stem (oregano, parsley, basil) or a woody one (rosemary, thyme, sage). For herbs with large leaves or tender, easily broken stems (cilantro, dill, mint), you may find it easier to strip them by hand.
Of course, you’ll still need to chop or mince the herbs in many cases, which brings us to another gadget you probably already have. A pizza cutter wheel makes short work of chopping leafy herbs; most are dishwasher-safe and easy on your wrist.
