Roasted Garlic - Simple, Sumptuous, and Salubrious!

Let's talk about garlic, that delicious and healthy bulb known affectionately as the "stinking-rose".  I mentioned in yesterday's post that my time in Italy started my love affair with Italian food.  As you might expect I can also trace my passion for garlic back to that glorious time in my life (my prior culinary experience was somewhat limited).  Garlic is a member of the allium family (allium sativum) which includes onions, leeks, chives, and shallots (called "aromatics" in cooking).  It has a pungent, spicy flavor that mellows and sweetens considerably with cooking and turns otherwise ordinary bread, sauces, dips, meats, pastas, vegetables, or most any savory dish into delectable delights.  It is often paired with onion, tomato, or ginger.

The garlic plant is native to central Asia and its history of human use goes back almost 7,000 years.   It was used for both food and medicine as far back as when the Giza Pyramids were built in Egypt.  Notice how garlic shows up in so many dishes.  It is a fundamental component in many or most dishes of various regions, including eastern Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, northern Africa, southern Europe, and parts of South and Central America.

In addition to its culinary popularity garlic has also been used medicinally since the very beginning.  Hippocrates, Galen, Pliny the Elder, and Dioscorides all mention the use of garlic for many conditions, including parasites, respiratory problems, poor digestion, and low energy.  Modern studies seem to bear out the healthful virtues of the stinking-rose.  For instance WebMD lists the following health conditions that benefit from garlic:

• High blood pressure - some research shows that garlic can reduce blood pressure in people with high blood pressure by as much as 7% or 8%. It also seems to lower blood pressure in people with normal blood pressure.
• “Hardening of the arteries” (Atherosclerosis) - as people age, their arteries tend to lose their ability to stretch and flex with age. Garlic seems to reduce this effect.
• Cancer - eating garlic seems to reduce the risk of developing colon cancer, rectal cancer, and stomach cancer.
• Tick bites – studies have shown that people who eat a lot of garlic get far fewer tick bites compared to people who do not eat garlic.
• Fungal infections of the skin (including ringworm, jock itch and athlete’s foot) - ringworm and jock itch respond to treatment with a garlic gel containing 0.6% ajoene (a chemical in garlic) that is applied to the skin. A garlic gel with a higher concentration of ajoene (1%) is needed to be effective against athlete’s foot. In fact, garlic gel with 1% ajoene seems to be about as effective against athlete’s foot as the medicine Lamisil.

I eat a lot of garlic because it's delicious in so many foods...the health benefits are simply a welcome bonus.  Have you ever had roasted garlic?  After about an hour in the oven this brash and pungent aromatic is tamed into a beautiful sweet caramelized spreadable delight.  The soft cloves just pop out of their skins.  They can be mashed with a fork and simply spread on warm bread with a little bit of salt.  Their savory mellifluous flavor makes them ideal for soups, dressings, meats, breads--really anything savory.

Here's how to roast your own garlic:

Take several entire bulbs of garlic to your cutting board, tip them on their sides, and carefully cut off the tips of the cloves (see the picture on the left above).  Place each bulb in a square of aluminum foil with the cut end up.  Drizzle with olive oil and then gather up the aluminum foil around the bulb and give it a twist.  Repeat this process with each of your garlic bulbs (if you're heating up your oven anyway you may as well make several of these at a time--roasted garlic keeps well in the fridge or it can be frozen).  Bake these globes at 400 degrees fahrenheit for 35 minutes.  You'll know they're ready because people in you're family will be asking "what is that fabulous smell?" or "whoa...what are we having for dinner?".

Take these out of the oven and unwrap them so they can cool down.  Once they are cool enough to handle peel off each clove and simply pinch the bottom.  The roasted delicious cloves will just pop out of their skin.  These can now be eaten straight, mashed with a fork, or sliced into bits to be used in recipes.

I'm making some roasted garlic sourdough bread today and can't wait to enjoy it for Easter dinner tomorrow.  Try roasting some garlic.  Its uses are myriad, it's delicious, and it's good for you too!