Peppermint and its relatives are mostly known as a medicine and popular herbs for infusions; for example, an infusion of green mint is the “national beverage” in Morocco and Tunisia.
British breeds of green mint are known as spearmint. They are very popular for flavouring cold soups, beverages and meats; together with thyme, spearmint is the most important culinary herb in Britain. Spearmint is the mint to use for the famous and often dreaded (by non-Englishmen) “peppermint” sauce served to boiled lamb. Today, most spearmint is actually used in the chewing gum industry (“doublemint”).
Peppermint originated in England, probably due to accidental hybridization. The oldest cultivar known, Black Mitcham, is named after a town near London; its leaves are dark due to anthocyanin pigments. Other varieties of peppermint are free from anthocyanins and are known as “white peppermint”.
In Britain, as in the rest of Europe, true peppermint is used almost exclusively for confectioneries and sweet liquors, where its cooling and fresh pungency balances the sweetness of the sugar. For all such purposes, the usage of pure essential oil is preferred in order to avoid the astringent to bitter notes of the peppermint leaves. The freshness of peppermint goes extremely well with chocolate flavour. Peppermint ice cream is especially delightful on a hot summer day, making use of the cooling properties of menthol (see vanilla).
Peppermint is much cultivated in many countries
of Europe, Western and Central Asia for the production of menthol, which
is needed in pharmaceutical preparations. In most of these countries,
peppermint entered local cuisine, replacing in part the native mints.
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| Carinthian mint, close-up to flowers |
Fresh mint is essential to flavour a celebrated specialty of Carinthia, Austria's most Southern region bordering Italy, whence the art of noodle-making was imported. Kärntner Kasnudeln (meaning loosely Carinthian cheese-stuffed dumplings or Carinthian cheese-pasta) are basically large ravioli-type noodles stuffed with a mixture of cottage cheese, boiled potatoes and fresh herbs. The herb mixture contains chervil and a special Carinthian mint variety with caraway scent which somewhat remembers spearmint. Boiled or steamed Kasnudeln are served with a few drops of molten butter as a snack between meals, or for dinner.
Fresh mint leaves are often used in Turkish cooking together with yoghurt (see garlic for an example); similar concoctions are in use in Lebanon and Israel (see parsley for the Lebanese salad tabbouleh). All over Western Asia, grilled lamb (kabab [كباب]) is flavoured with mint, and dried mint is part of the Georgian spice mixture khmeli-suneli.
Iranian
cuisine knows several highly sophisticated recipes employing mint; some
of these were later transferred to Northern India, e.g.,
moghul-style biriyani (see
saffron). Unlike the Western Asian foods containing
mint, the Persian recipes can, at least for my taste, also be prepared with
true peppermint.
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| Orange mint (Eau de Cologne mint) |
In the Far East, mint is also well known. It is chiefly of importance in the countries of the Malaysian peninsular, less so in Indonesia and China. In Thailand, local mint varieties are milder than European peppermint, standing somewhere in between true peppermint and spearmint. Together with other herbs, mainly basil and coriander (cilantro), mint is used in the hot Thai meat salad laab or larb [ลาบ], which originates from North Eastern Thailand (Isan [อีสาน]). It is commonly prepared from chicken (then known as laab gai [ลาบไก่]) and served with steamed glutinous rice as typical for the Isan region. Coarsely ground chicken meat is dressed with typical Thai flavourings (fish sauce, lime juice, shallots), a liberal amount of dried red chiles, raw vegetables and fresh greens, including coriander and mint leaves. Dried mint is not suitable for Thai recipes.
Mint is also highly popular in Vietnam, where fresh aromatic leaves are, in any
case, essential for the national character of the food and thus served as a
garnish to nearly every Vietnamese dish, particularly in the South. The most
popular herbs (besides some that are rarely available in the West) for this
purpose are coriander,
Vietnamese coriander (also known as
“Vietnamese mint”, which is confusing)
long coriander, basil
and mint. More often, a mild, spearmint- or
caraway-scented mint variety
(rau hung lui) is preferred to the more pungent,
menthol-containing type (rau hung cay); the former is often
served with North Vietnamese, Hanoi-type noodle soup (pho bo [phở bò],
see Vietnamese cinnamon). See also
Vietnamese coriander for further details.
