Fresh spearmint

[Primalclaws1974]

I lived in the Idaho mountains for a while when I was a boy. It seemed everyone had spearmint growing up there. It was pretty nice to eat it fresh. I remember it being sweet--or so I thought. I bought a spice rack not long ago, and there was ground spearmint in it. It didn't taste sweet at all! Are there more than one kind of spearmint plants? Is the process of drying and pulverizing the spearmint make it taste different? Or maybe my memory is getting cloudy? I am forty....

 

[gata montes]

Mint is one of my favorite herbs and one that I grow many different varieties of - all of which have different flavors and although I enjoy the flavor all year round - I don't dry mine as I have found that drying soft herbs takes away a lot of the flavor and because of that normally freeze mine in ice cubes instead - as they tend to retain not only their flavor that way but their texture too.

As there are literally hundreds of different mint varieties apart from just spearmint - like for instance

Mojito Mint and Curly Mint - both of which taste very similar to spearmint
Peppermint
Mint Julep
Ginger Mint
Orange Mint
Pineapple Mint
Apple Mint
and Chocolate Mint

to name but a few - maybe it was not spearmint that you remember but one of the other varieties

 

[Cereus]

There's lots of variety of mint, the thing about ground dry mint is that it loses potency very fast because essential oils are lost when drying which is why I prefer having mint oil if I want mint for cooking, ect. However if you keep fresh mint year round, you can easily harvest leaves for cooking, harvesting oil, ect.

 

[Lauren Chaste]

I want to start mint for health benefits and cooking wise. I have never tried it, never even bought it.

 

[claudine]

I've never eaten sweet mint. Maybe it's some rare variety? I hope you'll be able to find it, Primalclaws1974. If you do, please let us know about the name of it. I'd love to try it too