Steve B wrote:
>
> sold only in little pine needle shaped leaves? Can you buy it powdered or
> mashed? I looked, but didn't see it. I have an ulu with a cutting board
> made for it that has a depression in it matching the ulu. It works, but a
> lot goes flying.

If you dry out rosemary leaves they curl up and get nasty. They also
lose their essential oil in addition to their water unless you know
exactly how to dry them.

And so I get them by the twig off the plant on the patio and hang the
twig to dry. Then I mash the leaves just before use if I don't want the
leaves intact.

> Is rosemary like bay leaf, intended to be cooked whole, then filtered out of
> the final dish?

Nope. Rosemary leaves are delicious.

> And IF I do crunch some up, and put it in the pork roast marinade (which I
> did tonight for tomorrow's meal), are the particles bitter, or do they
> dominate the taste?

The oil tends to flow into the rest of the food making the particles
relatively mild.

> Tips on rosemary and its uses appreciated.

It rules in baked goods,stews.

If you live in southern California rosemary is planted on the sides of
the freeways. The stuff grows like kudzu and occasionally they feed it
wrecked cars as fertilizer. The stuff on the freeway side doesn't have
much aroma so I figure it isn't as tastey as the stuff that grows int he
yard. I don't know if that's because it is under watered or over
polluted or wrecked cars are crappy fertilizer. ;^)