Home Cooking Tips & Advice

A bouquet garni (french for garnished bouquet) is a simple trick used by many chefs to infuse flavorful herbs into sauces. There are many variety of bouquet garnis used. And different garnis will make the same dish taste very differently, even when all the same ingredients are used. It is a great way to give favorite dishes a fresh new spin.

Bouquet garnis are tied together with string - which is where they get the name bouquet. While there are traditional bouquets, you can also make your own. You should ideally use at least 3-4 herbs in a bouquet, and you can even add spices to the bouquet as well.

If you do not have access to fresh herbs, you can mix dried herbs and place them in a cheesecloth bag, tying the top closed before adding it to the sauce.

A simple - and most common - bouquet garni is:

4 stalks of parsley
2 sprigs of thyme
1 bay leaf