Okay, right now, I want you to get up, walk to your refrigerator, open the door, take that jar of minced garlic out and throw it away. Now get in your car, drive to the farmer's market, and buy some fresh garlic to cook with -- preferrably locally-grown hardnecks with a slightly purple, striped papery skin, because that's the best garlic you're ever going to find.
If you can't find that, buy whatever the farmer's market carries. Elephant garlic is bigger and has a more mellow flavor, and is heavenly when roasted.
If you don't live near a farmer's market, you can buy fresh garlic at your local supermarket. Beware, though, a lot of the garlic you'll find at your big megachain stores is grown overseas and shipped here, and the varieties that are produced for shipping are more durable and less flavorful. Still, it's better than the stuff in the jar.
Now that you have garlic to cook with, how do you use it? I mean, it's all papery and stuff, and it looks difficult to peel, right? Well, it's easier to use than it looks. You simply peel off as many layers as will come off easily, then break the big piece of garlic apart. Inside, you'll see smaller segments. These are the cloves of the garlic, so when a recipe calls for a "clove of garlic," it means one of those, not the whole thing. Pull a clove from the garlic, smack it with the side of a heavy knife, and squeeze -- the clove will pop right out. Or you can smack it with the knife then put the cloves (skins and all) into a bowl of water. Swish, to get the skins off the cloves, then pick them out of the water and put them into your recipe. (This keeps your hands from getting sticky, too.)
A lot of people are intimidated by garlic because it's so flavorful. It's like painting the wall red when you're decorating. It's bold, and it's daring, and it's something you can overdo. But it's so much better to learn how to cook with garlic than it is to avoid using it because you're afraid of its pungent flavor. To cook without garlic is like taking a trip to Paris and then staying in the hotel and watching TV. What's the point? Use the garlic. Use fresh garlic. Use a lot of it. Don't even bother with the stuff in the jar. After you've used fresh garlic, you won't want the stuff in the jar, anyway.
2 comments:
I agree. We always have fresh garlic in the house and put it in almost everything. It's so good! Tim had to teach me how to get the cloves out and how to chop them up, but yeah, I can do it myself now :)
It's so worth it.
I just bought a garlic press. It's easier than grating but kind of awkward to use. The jury's out on that gadget. Might just be easier to drag out the grater.
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