Quick Tip: How to Strip the Leaves from Herbs

Picking each individual leaf from a sprig of rosemary or thyme is one of the most boring and mind-numbing kitchen tasks we can think of. Happily, there is a little trick that makes it much easier!

You can actually strip all the leaves off of the stem in one fell swoop. Pinch the stem near the top with the fingers of one hand. Then run the fingers of your other hand down the length of the stem from top to bottom. This forces the leaves to break off from the stem right where they connect, leaving you with a naked stem in one hand and a pile of leaves on your cutting board!

This works best with herbs that have fairly woody stems, like rosemary, oregano, and thyme. If the stems are so tender that they snap, they're usually tender enough to eat, so we just chop those up along with the leaves.

Do you have another technique?

(Image: Flickr member The Bitten Word licensed under Creative Commons)

Comments (8)

Thanks for the tip about the stems that break being tender enought to eat... I always painstakingly go through and pick them out, and now I know I won't have to. Thanks!

posted by fib on September 21st 2009 at 11:14am
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That's exactly what I do with thyme: saves a lot of time.

posted by orchidgirl1979 on September 21st 2009 at 11:19am
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^^^lol at joke! great tip

posted by Madinat on September 21st 2009 at 1:00pm
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Please tell me this isn't serious. Who does not know that you can just pull all the individual sprigs off in one fell swoop? Really? Is there anyone who actually uses this herb who does this?

posted by Teacherteacher on September 21st 2009 at 4:06pm
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It works beautifully with thyme, but with rosemary I always get sticky goo all over my fingers. Does that happen with anyone else?

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posted by eprewitt on September 21st 2009 at 4:07pm
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Anyone who has watched Food Network in the past 5 years knows this tip. Come on, now...

posted by triedthistwice on September 22nd 2009 at 6:33am
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Hey, guys, give the newbie cooks a break! We all had to learn this trick somewhere!

posted by EmmaC on September 22nd 2009 at 10:23am
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THis works beautifully with thyme, but not with anything else. When I clicked on this link I was hoping you had another technique...

posted by kushkush on September 22nd 2009 at 3:26pm
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