I am fairly new to food connoisseurship, so I have a couple of what may appear to some to be stupid questions.
Basically, I am making Macaroni Cheese and Garlic Bread for dinner, and I have some spare dried Coriander leaves. By what method and process is Coriander best added to Macaroni Cheese? Should the Coriander be added during cooking, or after cooking?
Assuming fresh coriander, it all depends on how you want the dish flavoured. If you really like coriander, I would finely chop it, add it after the dish is cooked, and give it a stir through. That way, the flavour and colour will dominate.
If you want a milder version, add it during the cooking process. The flavour will be less distinct, and the leaves will turn very dark green/black, which may not look appealing against the light cheese colored sauce.
Dried coriander is more subtle still from a flavour perspective, it will need to be added sometime during the cooking process to rehydrate otherwise it might have a coarse mouth feel.
This is kind of an subjective question. I have never seen a recipe which adds coriander to mac and cheese, but that doesn't mean you can't add it. I love coriander to a point where I would eat it poached like vegetables in a Japanese shabu-shabu, so I would definitely try.
If your coriander is fresh, you can do a coarse chop and add towards the end of cooking similar to how you would garnish a dish with parsley. This will prevent the coriander leaves from wilting too much and preserve the freshness and fragrance of the herb.
If your coriander leaves are dry, I would try adding it when you make your roux, or when you are heating the milk/cream/cheese sauce to allow cooking time for the coriander to infuse into the sauce.
If you are American and by coriander you actually mean the coriander seeds and not "cilantro", I recommend the same method as the dry coriander leaves.
