Herbs of the Worlds Cuisines

Say you find a recipe for authentic Thai curry. While shopping for the ingredients, you find the store only has regular basil, the recipe calls for Thai basil. Well that should be fine right? No, not if you want authentic Thai curry. This is one of the many reasons to grow your own herbs. Growing your own herbs allows you to have access to the herbs that are needed for the type cuisine that appeals to you. Sure you can substitute but subtle differences in the flavor of substitutes can alter the final outcome. It may never taste quite as good as it did when fixed with the original ingredient.

Here we will cover some of the herbs, seasonings, and ingredients for different cuisines. Keep in mind these are only some of the main ingredients, not all.

Italian Cuisine
The following are herbs stand out as essential in Italian cuisine; basil, oregano, parsley, rosemary, sage and thyme. These are the foundation of Italian cooking.


Thai Cuisine
The essential ingredients for Thai cooking are lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, Fish sauce, garlic, Thai Chile peppers, Coconut milk, Galanga ‘a type of ginger’, palm sugar, Thai basil, and Jasmine rice.

Mexican Cuisine
The herbs and spices used in Mexican cooking are anise, bay leaf, cilantro, cinnamon, clove, cumin, epazote, marjoram, Mexican saffron, spearmint, sweet basil, thyme, watercress. There are also many peppers that are used.

Indian Cuisine
The herbs and spices for Indian Cuisine are; black pepper, cardamom, coriander, cumin, fenugreek, garlic, ginger, green or red chilies, Tamarind and turmeric. The classic Indian curry often contains a combination of some of these ingredients.

Moroccan Cuisine
The following herbs and spices are among the most commonly used in Moroccan cooking; anise seed, basil, black pepper, cayenne, cinnamon, coriander leaves, cumin, garlic, ginger, marjoram, paprika, parsley, sesame seed and turmeric. Allspice, caraway, cloves, coriander seeds and licorice are used to a lesser degree.

French Cuisine
In France all recipes for herbs de Provence include thyme, oregano, marjoram and rosemary. Then each chef may add basil, chives, chervil, fennel, lavender, mints or tarragon to mix their own special blend.

Spanish Cuisine
Two main ingredients of Spanish food are olive oil and garlic but onions and herbs such as oregano, rosemary and thyme may be used also.