With winter coming upon us and my weekly CSA box of local produce sadly coming to an end, I have been spending a fair few hours preserving food in the kitchen. I love preserving food, because while you can get fresh produce year round because of grocery stores, you didn’t help grow it yourself in your local community, and to me you just can’t taste the sunshine after your food has been trucked across state or country lines. So, I have been hoarding some of the garlic I’ve received throughout the CSA season (community supported agriculture) to cook up some simple roasted garlic to enjoy when the weather cools down and baking bread in the kitchen is no longer stifling!
Roasted garlic is incredibly versatile. You can pop it into pretty much any dish- from your jumble of veggies to inside of a roasting turkey for Thanksgiving. Plus, if you store it in its own oil you have an infused olive oil that is simply perfect for slathering on crostini. So, with a few minutes of prep and an oven you can enjoy the taste of farm-fresh garlic year round.
Roasted Garlic Ingredients
Heads of Garlic
Olive Oil
Salt and Pepper
Roasted Garlic Instructions
1 Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.
2 If your garlic heads are coming straight from the garden like mine, make sure to wash any residual dirt off the head- we will be keeping the oil poured over the garlic.
3 Using a very sharp knife so that you can cut through your garlic cloves, stem, and paper in a single motion, slice the top of the garlic off, just enough so that you expose the cloves. Remove any excess paper that flakes off.
4 Place garlic cloves, cut side up, in an oven-safe dish. Depending on the amount of garlic you’re preparing, use the smallest size dish you can that will still fit all of your garlic heads.
5 Pour olive oil over each garlic head and massage into the crevices. I used about a cup of oil for my 6 garlic heads, but use as much as you need to coat the garlic and have a small layer of garlic in the bottom of your dish.
6 Season with salt and pepper if desired.
7 Pop into your preheated oven for 45-55 minutes or until garlic cloves are nicely browned and can be pressed out of their coating easily.
8 If you’re using your garlic right away, just pop out the garlic and enjoy! If you plan on preserving the excess, pop out each garlic head into a jar and then place a strainer on top. Pour the dish of olive oil through the strainer to sift out any remaining garlic paper fragments. Seal the jar and enjoy!
As with any home-infused oil, make sure that you only keep out an amount of oil that you can use in a few days time to avoid the risk of botulism. I keep the remainder of my oil frozen and just let it thaw before use!
What is your favorite way to use roasted garlic? I’d love to know in the comments below!
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