7 Cooking Hacks to Cook With Garlic

There are a number of different ways to peel garlic cloves. One effective method is to crush them using the broad side of a knife blade. While this method is perfectly safe if you treat the knife blade with care, some cooks would rather skip the knife altogether. Here are some other options.
A. Here’s a method that’s particularly useful if you want to end up with whole, intact cloves: place the garlic cloves on a microwave-safe plate in the microwave and cook on high power for 10 to 20 seconds. Rub the skins gently to remove.
B. If crushed cloves aren’t a problem, try whacking the clove with the bottom of a can. The weight helps crush the clove, and the lip at the bottom of the can keeps it neatly in place on the counter.
C. Cover the garlic clove with the concave side of a wooden spoon and press down hard. The cup of the spoon prevents the garlic clove from shooting out across the counter.

Home cooks often shy away from hand-mincing garlic because it can be sticky stuff. If a recipe leaves you no alternative, try this helpful tip.
1. Sprinkle a few drops of olive or vegetable oil over the garlic.
2. Proceed to chop or mince; the oil coats the garlic and keeps it from sticking to either the knife or your hands.

When you are making a recipe that calls for both garlic and herbs, you can combine the tasks and make both of them easier. When chopping garlic by itself, the garlic often sticks to the knife, riding up on the sides of the blade. If you chop the garlic and herbs together, the garlic sticks to the herbs, rather than to the knife.

Making garlic paste with the blade of a chef’s knife (where the flat edge of the blade breaks down the minced garlic) takes practice. Sidestep the knife work with this easy method.
1. Coarsely chop garlic cloves and sprinkle with a pinch of salt.
2. Using the flat, unglazed underside of a small ramekin, press the garlic against the cutting board, smearing it to make a smooth paste.

In addition to grating nutmeg, citrus, and hard cheese, a rasp-style grater is an ideal tool for producing finely pureed garlic, shallot, or onion. For recipes such as Caesar salad or aïoli, peel a clove of garlic and grate it on the grater before adding it to the recipe.

Roasting garlic is one of the most delicious ways to enjoy it. This process mellows the pungency of the bulb and releases the sugars, giving it a rich caramel flavor. To do so, slice off the top of the head of garlic and drizzle it with olive oil. Season with salt and pepper and wrap with foil. Bake at 350f for approximately 40 min. Once the roasted garlic has cooled, simply squeeze the bottom of the head of garlic and the roasted cloves will pop out. To prevent burning your garlic when cooking in a frying pan, always add it toward the end of your process.
Roasted garlic cloves are great for spreading on bread or stirring into soups and stews for extra flavor, but it can take some time and patience to extrude the roasted cloves from their papery skins. Here’s one way to streamline the process: after dry-toasting individual garlic cloves on the stovetop, pass the unpeeled cloves through a garlic press. This creates a perfectly smooth paste, and the garlic peel is easily removed from the press.

When making bean soup, vegetable soup, or another such dish, you can boost and deepen the garlic flavor by adding a whole head. Just rub the papery outer layer of skin off an intact head of garlic, cut about ½ inch off the top to expose the flesh of the cloves, and throw the head into the soup pot. When the soup is done, remove the garlic head and either discard it or squeeze the softened garlic into the soup to further flavor and thicken it.
And one more thing:
Is your ivory-colored garlic is suddenly a blue-green color? When garlic is minced in its raw form and comes into contact with an acid (lemon juice, vinegar), the acid begins to break down the garlic, changing its composition. This alteration creates a reaction with garlic’s amino acids and a blue-green color results. (this color change is harmless, except to the appearance of your dish.)