Is all sage edible?

April 29, 2010 3:19 PM

Is all sage edible?

I bought a sage plant for my front garden as an ornamental plant. A couple of years later, now, with no memory of what variety of sage it was, I am curious if I can use the sage in recipes. Are there types of sage that are merely ornamental, and are not edible? I am not the adventurous type, so I don't want to just put it in a recipe and see if the family gets sick. I'm in PA if that matters.

posted by molasses to home & garden (9 answers total)

"Sage" can refer to an awful lot of different plants. Some of 'em are food, some aren't.
posted by nebulawindphone at 3:26 PM on April 29, 2010

Some sage is psychoactive.
posted by jardinier at 3:29 PM on April 29, 2010

Edible? Yes, well as far as I know.

Of culinary quality, or worth the effort to chew? No.

Where I used to live (Austin) there were hundreds (OK. A great many) plants called sage, from ground covers to hedges, and salvia (its genus) is huge and popular as flowers all over. But the long, flat leafed, aromatic version is special and, I hear, a hard herb to grow.
posted by Some1 at 3:30 PM on April 29, 2010

If you're not adventurous, don't eat it. Sage plants are marketed as culinary and ornamental for a reason. Sages are salvia plants, and some salvias will make you see things. Crazy things.
posted by mudpuppie at 3:47 PM on April 29, 2010

OK, this is good to know. I've decided not to cook with what is in my garden! While trying to google this on my own, specifically in reference to edibleness, there were an awful lot of articles with an awful lot of info, and none of them seemed to say "You may eat this kind" or "You may not eat this kind". So thank you for bearing with me.
posted by molasses at 3:55 PM on April 29, 2010

The edible and delicious variety of sage is incredibly easy to grow -- plop it into some dry sandy area that gets a bit of sun and neglect it-- i.e., don't fertilize and don't water much if at all.
posted by bearwife at 4:03 PM on April 29, 2010

can we get a picture of this sage?
posted by miss patrish at 6:59 PM on April 29, 2010

There's lots of different kinds. Post a pic of yours.
posted by Burhanistan at 6:59 PM on April 29, 2010

If you post a picture here, your sage can easily be identified if it's the edible kind, and probably even if it's not. There's only one culinary sage species.
posted by oneirodynia at 7:00 PM on April 29, 2010