What IS it used for?

[Creemteez]

Curry plant. So often you hear it mentioned as part of a herb garden on different gardening programmes and articles, but nearly always with the tag line "..although not used in curries...."
So what IS it used for, apart from entertaining your friends when they visit the plot (guess what that is)? I did grow some a couple of years ago, and to be honest, couldn't stick it. I wanted to use it, not just be engulfed by the smell every time I walked past it!
In the end I "set it free" (planted it in the field out the back) but I think the frost or the sheep "did for it".
Has anyone got a use for it (preferably in a curry!)?

[Mustard]

I'll be interested to see the replies, I have just planted some in a half barrel with some rosemary, sage and Marjoram.
I would like to use it myself

[Alice]

The plant is edible Creemteez but the flavour is poor. I had some but just hated the smell of it in the garden. I only enjoy the smell of curry in the kitchen. I just got rid of it. I think it's more of a novelty than anything else.
Taste the plant yourself and see what you think.

[Samwise]

Apparently the oil you can get from it has medicinal properties, other than that I don't think it has many uses

[digthatchick]

Helichrysum italicum or Curry plant is more ornamental than culinary. As Alice says its flavour is very weak. I have used it while building sensory gardens, and children love it, it is a scent that most children recognise easily (they are always picking bits off and rolling it in their hands) if it is prevented from getting too leggy, its silvery leaves look nice in borders.

[MrsC]

You can add it to rice apparently although never tried it

[pdblake]

I usually put some in a dish with lavender as pot purri

[Snadger]

I've seen Madhur Jaffrey cooking with 'curry leaves' quite a lot. I know it's not the same plant .......but what's that all about then?

[Alice]

No it's not the same plant Snadger. The curry leaves Madhur Jaffrey is cooking with are curry flavoured and traditional in Indian cooking - that's what it's all about.

[jackie j]

One of the houses in our street used to house students, and me and a neighbour passed it every day taking the kids to school, we thought the students must have had curry again ( every day ). After the students moved out and someone else moved in we found out the big bush in the front garden was a curry plant lol.

[Growem]

You can chop them up and put them in scrambled eggs.

[flowerpots]

I'm pretty sure that my copy of the Hessayon guide to vegetables and herbs says it's mildy toxic, I'd have to double check though...

[maytreefrannie]

No it's not the same plant Snadger. The curry leaves Madhur Jaffrey is cooking with are curry flavoured and traditional in Indian cooking - that's what it's all about.

Does anyone know what plant those curry leaves are from?