Garlic is really an amazing plant. While I think it can be overused in cooking, there are some places in the kitchen where it really shines. One of my favorite ways to prepare it is to roast in with some salt and olive oil. The buttery soft, sweet cloves then slip out of their papery skins and go deliciously with roasted chicken and in mashed potatoes. The roasted cloves can also be spread on a crostini with some warm goat cheese and herbs of your choice.
Because it provides us with much more than its food value, garlic certainly has its place as one of the all time greatest gifts from nature. It is well known for its antimicrobial and healing properties. And along those lines it can be brewed into a "tea" and sprayed on fruit trees as an immune booster and pest deterrent.
These garlic scapes are actually the flower buds of the garlic plant. They come up in June as the days lengthen (it is almost the summer solstice now) and need to be picked so that the plant does not expend its energy on seed making. We want the energy to go to the developing bulb below ground.
So with all these scapes, what can you do? We tossed them in olive oil and sea salt and roasted them with some Parmigiano- Reggiano and red pepper flakes. Along with some rustic bread and assortment of cheeses, they made a delicious early summer lunch and disappeared quickly.
Because it provides us with much more than its food value, garlic certainly has its place as one of the all time greatest gifts from nature. It is well known for its antimicrobial and healing properties. And along those lines it can be brewed into a "tea" and sprayed on fruit trees as an immune booster and pest deterrent.
These garlic scapes are actually the flower buds of the garlic plant. They come up in June as the days lengthen (it is almost the summer solstice now) and need to be picked so that the plant does not expend its energy on seed making. We want the energy to go to the developing bulb below ground.
So with all these scapes, what can you do? We tossed them in olive oil and sea salt and roasted them with some Parmigiano- Reggiano and red pepper flakes. Along with some rustic bread and assortment of cheeses, they made a delicious early summer lunch and disappeared quickly.
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