Time to plant the shiso!
We have two nice pots of shiso which reseed themselves every year, but if you’re not so fortunate it’s (past) time to plant the shiso for a summer harvest. What is shiso you ask? According to this excellent Australian food blog shiso and its cousin perilla “contain an amazing number of aromatic compounds, including limonene, which gives a citrus flavour, compounds also found in mint and basil, and others that smell like almonds, wood and honeysuckle. For a leafy green, they also have a decent whack of glutamic acid, which add to a dish’s sense of deliciousness.”
We use shiso primarily in sushi (packets of just a few leaves sell for a couple of bucks in Japanese markets, and we already have dozens of them) where a salty, tangy slice of saba (pickled mackerel) and bitter, fragrant shiso are a perfect match. We use it interchangeably with mint and basil in sauces and Mediterranean dishes that deserve a perky accent. We pickle it, put it in coleslaw and add to mignonette. Yet somehow we still end up with a horde of shiso leaves at the end of the season.
Last year we just stuffed them in the freezer which wasn’t a great idea; the leaves devolved into a dark green glob that retains the taste but lends an unappealing texture to dishes. A much better idea is to make sushi kimchi which will keep for weeks in the fridge. Maagchi’s recipe actually is for perilla, the Korean cousin of shiso, but we use shiso because that is what we have.
It was a while back that we purchased a tiny envelope of shiso seeds to get us started; we think they were from Kitazawa, now sold through True Leaf Market, which offers no fewer than 13 different varieties of shiso and perilla seeds.
Our shiso garden, in a sunny, east-facing spot.
Plant your seeds in a sunny, well-drained spot in the ground or in a large pot like ours. The size of the leaves you get seems to depend on the size of the container. Shiso in the ground will yield big leaves about 3 inches across which are perfect for wrapping Korean ssam or Japanese rice dishes; in a small flower pot you’ll get small leaves that are useful for seasoning.
We’ve been silly about shiso for a long time, dating back to this post in 2018 when we had a bush in a former home. That article describes guidelines for using shiso (works with anything fishy, and as a 1:1 substitute for basil) plus still more uses like shiso in grilled cheese sandwiches. So go get started. It’s tiime to plant the shiso!
