Confit Garlic

Mostly I use fresh garlic, clove by clove, taken from a bulb. Occasionally - very occasionally - if I am making a garlic heavy dish (like garlic roast chicken, or lamb shanks with 40 cloves of garlic) - I break down and buy a small box of pre-peeled garlic cloves to save time and my fingers.

Garlic-heavy dishes somehow always seem to need a lengthy time in the oven, so I kill two birds with one stone by making garlic confit at the same time, since the oven is on anyway and my house is going to be redolent of garlic no matter what.

This keeps in the fridge for a long time. You can use the oil for cooking and salad dressings, and the cloves themselves for a myriad of things from dressings to sauces, for adding depth of flavor to soups and stews, or simply spread on toast along with soft cheese and served with a glass of red wine for a solo TV dinner.

As you all know from reading this blog, I love an easy to make, workhouse of an ingredient. This is right up there.

Contents of a store-bought container of fresh peeled garlic cloves

Enough olive oil to cover the cloves by about 1/2 an inch

Place the cloves in an oven safe container with a lid. Top with the olive oil.

Place in a 375 degree oven and cook until the cloves are very soft about 30 minutes.

Remove from the oven and set aside until cooled to room temperature. This will also allow the cloves to use the residual heat from the oil and the container to finish cooking.

Transfer to a container and keep in the fridge until needed.