Chives belong to the Alliaceae family, like garlic and onions. A perennial plant, it thrives both in pots and in the ground. Easy to grow, it's THE essential aromatic plant in the kitchen.
From sowing it to cooking it, we tell you everything you need to grow and enjoy it 🌱
👉 To grow your own herbs on your balcony, discover our composting vegetable garden.
Contents
Growing chives
Chives were cultivated for their medicinal and condiment properties by ancient civilizations such as the Chinese over 5,000 years ago, the Egyptians and the Romans.
Today, it is an essential ingredient in French, Eastern European and Asian cuisine.
Sowing, planting, harvesting
Native to Europe and Asia, chives are easy to grow in pots or in the ground!
- Sow seeds from March to May.
- Plant in spring or autumn.
- From May to July, this aromatic plant is covered with pink flowers.
- Harvest from May to October. Cut the leaves as and when you need them - chives grow back as much as you like!
Multiply your plant by dividing clumps every 3 to 4 years.
A self-fertilizing vegetable garden for growing and composting in a small space
Easy & Odorless
Handcrafted in Portugal
Design
Compact
Modular
2x more harvests than in pots
How do you water it?
In pots, water as soon as the surface of the soil dries out. Avoid over-watering, as this will rot the roots.
Exposure: how to place it in the vegetable garden?
This aromatic plant appreciates sun and partial shade.
Wedding: which other plants should it go with?
In the vegetable garden, combine chives with tomatoes, carrots or celery.
Not to be confused with spring onions
Although often confused, chives and spring onions are two distinct plants belonging to the Alliaceae family.
How can you tell them apart?
- Appearance: chives are very thin, resembling blades of grass, while spring onions are thicker, resembling a small leek.
- Root system: chives have a larger bulb than chives.
Cooking chives
An essential aromatic plant
This herb has been cultivated since ancient times for its culinary and medicinal properties.
Add fresh chive leaves to your dishes. Chives add a fresh, garlicky touch to salads, omelettes and fromage frais. Low in calories, it's rich in vitamins, minerals and fiber.
Did you know? The flowers are also delicious! But unlike spring onions, the bulb is not edible.
How to store it?
Here are a few tips for preserving your chives:
- In the fridge: Chive leaves keep for about a week. Ideally, they should be stored in a damp cloth.
- In the freezer: For ready-to-cook portions, freeze your chives in an ice cube tray! Place your chopped leaves in each hole of the tray, then fill with a little water or oil three-quarters full. These aromatic little ice cubes will be super easy to use when you're cooking 😉
But don't dry the leaves - they lose all their flavour!
Our recipe:
Ingredients for 25 Duchesse apples :
- 4 or 5 potatoes
- 2 egg yolks
- 50 g grated Parmesan cheese
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 250 g butter (truffled, it's so good!)
- Chives
- Nutmeg
- Salt and pepper
Recipe:
First, peel the potatoes and cut them into large chunks. Mince the garlic and chop the chives.
Cook potatoes until tender, about 20 minutes. Puree.
Gently melt the chopped butter in a frying pan. Stir regularly to prevent sticking. Add the minced garlic.
Fold the mixture into the purée, followed by the egg yolks and herbs. The finishing touch: add 50g grated Parmesan and a pinch of nutmeg. Mix to a smooth paste.
Pour the mixture into a piping bag. On a baking tray lined with baking paper, form small mounds of purée.
Brush with melted butter and bake at 200°C for 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and brush again with melted butter. Continue baking for a further 10 minutes, until golden brown.
Did you know?
Chives feature in Charlemagne's De Villis capitulary, which lists hundreds of plants whose cultivation is ordered in royal gardens !
