Here’s My Unexpected Love Letter to Tarragon

Ever experience a gastronomical double-take? It’s what I call an encounter with a certain flavor that instantly strikes me as equal parts fabulous, foreign and familiar. A flash of revelatory tasting that sends a resounding where-in-the-world-have-you-been-all-my-life through my whole being — which, by the way, is exactly what happened to me with tarragon. 

Yes. The herb, tarragon. 

For whatever reason, tarragon had previously flown right by my radar. I’m sure I had tasted it once or twice prior, but I guess it never made much of an impact. It certainly didn’t tug at my heart like cilantro, the all-star who makes regular appearances atop my fish tacos and seafood soups; or even the ever-classic and distinguished dill, who takes wild salmon to one of the truest expressions of its glory. But tarragon? It just never registered. 

Until one day recently, when a dear friend — whose spirit I adore and palate I trust — suggested I cook some of our wild-caught fish using the herb in question. “You won’t regret it,” he said, with the assuredness of a classically trained French chef. Ever curious, as I tend to be regarding matters of the appetite, I bought myself a jar.

I discovered that tarragon is commonly referred to as “the king of herbs.” I also learned that the plant hails from the sunflower family, that it has been used historically for its flavor-enhancing properties, and that there exist French, Russian and Mexican varieties of tarragon.

All that said, what ensued in my kitchen for not one, but four nights in a row, was nothing short of a love affair with tarragon, in which the herb’s sweet and subtle anise-y notes left its aromatic impression on everything from spot prawns on polenta to simply sauteed sockeye. At once elegant, unique and robust, tarragon seemed to dance into the limelight of our senses, enlivening our meals by imbuing them with an interesting new (for us anyway) sensory layer.

Such was my unexpected delight, that I wondered if it wasn’t time for a refresher course on all the lost herbs of my pantry, because just as tarragon recently emerged as the herbal MVP in our household, it also — and perhaps more importantly — serves as a reminder for me to re-engage with all the hidden, unpredictable and forgotten flavors in my kitchen that are just waiting to become my new favorite thing.