Garlic and the cooking

budec

I bought 2 big o'le "cloves" of Garlic while at the market today.

I heard it was good for you (health wise) and also that "real" chiefs use it.

um. I don't really know what I'm suppose to do with it. I think I have to cook it, cause raw it's pretty bitter.

Anyone have any recipes? Preference is for vegetarian recipes cause I'm more or less vegetarian for the most part.

Thanks!

Tube

Well uh, people don't normally just eat it on it's own.

Fry it in some oil when you're making pasta, or use it as a seasoning in general.

Newton

When cooking with garlic, remember that the smaller you chop it, the stronger the flavor will be. Whole roasted garlic is very sweet and mild, while minced garlic will give a lot of "garlic" flavor to your dish.

Also, if you burn garlic, just throw it out and start over. Burned garlic is very bitter and disgusting.

A really simple way to make a galic-y dish is garlic spinach. Sweat some minced garlic in olive oil until it is soft and translucent. Toss in a bunch of fresh spinach and turn to coat in the pan. Cook the spinach until it just starts to wilt a little. Take off the heat, season with a little salt and pepper and enjoy.

Roasted garlic spread on baguette slices is very good. Just cut off the top of the whole head of garlic so that the cloves are exposed. Drizzle some olive oil over the top and season with salt and pepper. Wrap in foil and bake at 350° for about 30-45 minutes until the garlic is soft. Squeeze out a clove and spread on toasted baguette slices.

Pheezer

Get a garlic crusher, saves time for the mincing.

deadonthestreet

Or, just take a clove and a big knife, and smack the garlic with the flat side of the knife, crushing it.

Thanatos

Despite the amusement it would give me to try to see you cook with those:

You didn't buy two "cloves" of garlic. You bought two heads of garlic. Each of the little pieces you pull off is a clove.

Pheezer

deadonthestreet wrote: »

Or, just take a clove and a big knife, and smack the garlic with the flat side of the knife, crushing it.

Garlic crushers force the clove through tiny little holes making itty bitty pieces of garlic instantly, saving you from needing to mince it with a knife, a time consuming process. You seem to be unfamiliar with the tool as your post appears irrelevant to the use of a garlic crusher.

Hamju

I mostly use garlic while caramalizing onions, but really you can use it with most everything. Frying some meat (like sausage)? Toss some chopped (finely chopped... Newton is right) garlic into the grease near the end of cooking it for a bit of extra flavour. Got a sauce? Add some garlic in really at any time (especially pasta sauce).

Basically with garlic I like to think of that saying "Oregano makes it Italian, tarragon makes it French, sour cream makes it Russian, and garlic makes it good."

Edit:

pheezer FD wrote: »

deadonthestreet wrote: »

Or, just take a clove and a big knife, and smack the garlic with the flat side of the knife, crushing it.

Garlic crushers force the clove through tiny little holes making itty bitty pieces of garlic instantly, saving you from needing to mince it with a knife, a time consuming process. You seem to be unfamiliar with the tool as your post appears irrelevant to the use of a garlic crusher.

I don't use a garlic crusher simply because it's a pain in the ass to clean and I like chopping garlic.

deadonthestreet

I was posting it as an alternative to the garlic crusher. You can just crush it with your knife. I'm aware of what garlic crushers do. I just feel that they are kind of surpurflous when a knife can do the same job in the same amount of time.

I'm not talking about cutting it up I'm talking about laying the garlic on your cutting board and smacking the hell out of it with the broad side of your knife.

Pheezer

deadonthestreet wrote: »

I'm not talking about cutting it up I'm talking about laying the garlic on your cutting board and smacking the hell out of it with the broad side of your knife.

Yes I know but that doesn't make it into little pieces like the garlic crusher does

Corvus

pheezer FD wrote: »

deadonthestreet wrote: »

I'm not talking about cutting it up I'm talking about laying the garlic on your cutting board and smacking the hell out of it with the broad side of your knife.

Yes I know but that doesn't make it into little pieces like the garlic crusher does

I just use the knife to squish the clove, then dice it thinly. Cleaning those Garlic press things is a pain.

Omnicron9999

Check out this thread:

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=15601

Yes I know it is about meat mostly...

However, there is a good deal of garlic related advice there. Especially when it comes to potatoes, which shine when using garlic.

Rye

garlic is a strong scent. Soap and anything that opens the pores works well. WARM WATER helps too.

Garlic is one of those things in your body that you can smell in your sweat if you've
eaten it recently. So make you you aren't planning on making an impression on anyone after eating it.

The thing to remember is that you don't need a ton of garlic for the garlic taste. If you cook with onions AND garlic, you won't have to use much of either. Onion is a ingredient that exposes taste buds to more taste, so when combined with garlic, it becomes more about subtlety. As for portioning, our family uses 3-6 cloves of garlic for 2lbs of spaghetti - and we're probably overdoing it.

Baguette is really just the longer loaf of bread you see at fancy restaurants. It's leaps and bounds much better tasting than wonder bread.

The "top" is the thinner part of the head or clove. The onion-looking skin is bunched up at the top end.

On a side not, the advantage of manually crushing the garlic is that it combines the step of having to take the skin off. Simply cut the hard tips off, crush with the wide edge of a knife, then remove the skin.

Tube

If you hate garlic smell, instead of chopping garlic each time you want to use it, chop two or three heads in one go, and put the chopped garlic in a jar with some olive oil.

Fencingsax

make sure you get all the papery bits off, first. My sister forgot to once. It was... an experience.

ElJeffe

budec wrote: »

I don't have baguette or don't know what it is... but toast/bread would work, right?

Any long, sourdough bread thingy will work. Baguettes, batards, puglieses, these are all just variations on "long, skinny loaf of bread", and they all work well with garlic.

Speaking of bread and garlic, a good garlic bread is easy to make.

Take a sourdough loaf and slice it lengthwise. Then take, I dunno, 3 tablespoons? of butter or margerine. Margerine is easier, because it's softer and spreads better. Add about 1 tablespoon of olive oil, a teaspoon of dried basil, and a teaspoon of chopped garlic. Mix it together, and spread it on the bread. I'm guessing on the amounts, because I never measure anything, so if it's not enough to create a good, thick coating on the bread, just makes some more using the same proportions.

Toss the bread, buttered side up, in the oven and broil it for about 5 minutes, or until the top of the bread starts to brown a little.

tech_hunter

ElJeffe thats about the same way i make garlic bread except i usually use garlic powder, since I dont enjoy smelling like garlic for a week