Salad Burnet has been grown in kitchen gardens for centuries, valued for leaves that carry a faint cucumber flavor and remain attractive even through mild winters. The plant forms a low, airy rosette of pinnate leaves, each leaflet neatly toothed, and reaches roughly one to two feet in height. It thrives in the kind of conditions most other herbs resent: dry, infertile, alkaline soils on chalk or limestone are its natural home, and it will establish itself in ground that defeats more finicky neighbors.

For kitchen use, the youngest leaves from the center of the plant are the most tender and flavorful. Regular cutting back keeps the plant in productive growth and prevents the somewhat unshowy green flowers from setting seed and spreading across the garden. If self-seeding is welcome, let a few heads ripen and the plant will naturalize easily. Despite the name, Salad Burnet is not closely related to its American cousin and is fully drought tolerant once established, making it a practical choice for the front of a dry border or the edge of an herb garden.