Slog
News & ArtsMonday, September 26, 2011
Chow Before You Make Dinner Tonight, Learn How to Peel Garlic in 10 Seconds
Posted by Megan Seling on Mon, Sep 26, 2011 at 5:33 PM
This changes everything:
(Thanks for the tip, Alithea!)
1
Or, if you have small children, give it to them to peel. It takes much longer, and it's probably not too hygienic, but it keeps them busy and feeling helpful as you prepare dinner.
8
That's nice if you want to get two huge bowls dirty peeling garlic. I simply crush garlic with the side of my knife. Easy, fast, no extra dishes.
I guess if you were going to use those bowls anyway it would work?
I guess if you were going to use those bowls anyway it would work?
10
I want to try that just because it involves vigorously shaking aluminum bowls and making a lot of racket. Yeah!
11
Wait, he uses BOWLS? That's insane. Snip, crush, peel -- it should take three seconds with your knife. If you're good you don't even need to snip -- two seconds. Maybe you have to give your fingers a quick rinse to get the paper off, but jeez -- wash bowls?
12
This is for dishes calling for uncrushed cloves, though, no? Yes, crushing makes peeling easy, but if the recipe calls for uncrushed cloves, here's a way to do that. No biggie.
13
Meh, just smash it. With the broad side of your knife or with a can of food or something. smashed garlic is easier to chop.
15
@12, if you have a delicate, almost caressing touch you can crack the skin without pulping the clove. I can't think of any dish requiring full cloves that can't handle a very slightly split one. You have to be able to CHARM the skin off.
17
There it is, then, @15. Nobody and nothing ever told me I had a delicate or caressing touch with food prep, much less charm. I'm very much the type like internet jen @13, happy to club away at garlic with whatever anvil or shoe is handiest. That's why the bowl thing is perfect for a mook like me - big noise, lots of clanging, but it leaves me with cloves, not paste.
18
You can easily crack the clove in your hands and the peel falls right off. It's a really simple technique and leaves the clove in better shape for mincing than knife-crushing.
20
Those rubber jar opener things work just as well for smaller quantities of garlic, but I could totally see myself doing this if I felt compelled to make 40 cloves chicken at home.
21
Poulet aux Quarante Gousses d'Ail. Is one recipe that calls for numerous cloves of garlic, forty to be exact. Although I find 15 cloves to be sufficient. I prefer to peel by hand, though.
22
@14 - If you can't think of a single recipe that would call for a whole head of garlic I can only assume that you serve hamburger helper and Top Ramen at dinner parties.
23
I can see this being very useful when you need a whole lot of garlic and don't want to peel each piece, fnarf style (which is how I normally do it).
It will probably come in useful the next time my mother makes something she calls "hundred garlic chicken". It is basically a whole chicken, stuffed with peeled but uncrushed garlic, and surrounded by peeled, uncrushed garlic then cooked in a crockpot. As long as you *don't* crush the garlic, it is sweet and not overly strong. Crushing the garlic too much ruins the flavor.
It will probably come in useful the next time my mother makes something she calls "hundred garlic chicken". It is basically a whole chicken, stuffed with peeled but uncrushed garlic, and surrounded by peeled, uncrushed garlic then cooked in a crockpot. As long as you *don't* crush the garlic, it is sweet and not overly strong. Crushing the garlic too much ruins the flavor.
24
If you ask a friend to do that bowl shit and they refuse...well, then, they're totally a vampire.
27
We put up 48 quarts of dill pickles in August- which we like to use whole cloves of garlic for, and a measly one head of garlic only does about 4 jars- so I will be using this trick next year, for sure.
28
Fnarf, these are easy bowls to wash. If you need to crush a whole head, do this and wash an extra bowl. If less, use your garlic-peeler-sleeve thingy.
29
I'll continue to be OCD by cracking my garlic on the flat of the blade, trimming off the tippity tops, hand peeling them, and then ultra finely dicing them with a knife, mostly because I can.
30
In the final frame the clove looks like it still has some peel still on. Has anyone actually tried this method? I'm in a hotel and away from any garlic cloves right now...
32
All you "just smash and peel" folks need
to explain how you can smash and peel a whole bulb of garlic in < 10 secs.
Sure, if you're trying to peel one clove, it's probably not worth dirtying some bowls; but if you need to scale that operation up, I think the bowls become an attractive option.
to explain how you can smash and peel a whole bulb of garlic in < 10 secs.
Sure, if you're trying to peel one clove, it's probably not worth dirtying some bowls; but if you need to scale that operation up, I think the bowls become an attractive option.
33
About 10 years ago I switched to the diced garlic in baby food jars. Plus: it never dries out in the fridge. Minus: horror on mom's face when I told her.
34
who the fuck has large matching bowls that aren't made from a ceramic material, am I the only one? This isn't even an option for most people I would guess.
35
@26 oh yes indeed he is. One of the best qualities of bears is that many of them end up being excellent cooks (let's face it: you don't become rather portly if you don't have a pretty serious love affair with food).
And I probably won't use this technique unless I need a ton of garlic, but it was still pretty amazing to watch.
And I probably won't use this technique unless I need a ton of garlic, but it was still pretty amazing to watch.
37
I tried this technique last year when I was making my annual batch of pesto (for the freezer). It kind of works. Notice that he said "the good cloves will be clean". Most of them are clean, but not all. If your garlic is lots of small cloves, this is not very effective--the larger cloves clean themselves off the best.
It also bruises the cloves, which might be an issue for some recipes (not for pesto).
Another thing is that if you don't hold the bowls tightly together, you get wisps of garlic peel everywhere. And doing multiple heads makes a pretty big mess on the bowl--you still have to clean off the peel which starts to stick to the cloves if they are bruised.
So, it's fun, but not necessarily any faster.
p.s., those stainless steel bowls are great to use for prep work & cooking. Get them at Seattle Restaurant Supply for cheap.
It also bruises the cloves, which might be an issue for some recipes (not for pesto).
Another thing is that if you don't hold the bowls tightly together, you get wisps of garlic peel everywhere. And doing multiple heads makes a pretty big mess on the bowl--you still have to clean off the peel which starts to stick to the cloves if they are bruised.
So, it's fun, but not necessarily any faster.
p.s., those stainless steel bowls are great to use for prep work & cooking. Get them at Seattle Restaurant Supply for cheap.
39
Or, you could just go to Fou Lee market on Beacon Hill and buy about 3 heads-worth of pre-peeled garlic for $1.50 (and it's not the gross, chemically-treated stuff that you find in most supermarkets). Also check out the amazing BBQ pork skewers while you're there.
40
@33
Thank you. I'll use fresh garlic when things really demand it, but the stuff in jars, like so many other things in jars works just fine - and is both a lot less work, and a hell of a lot cheaper.
Thank you. I'll use fresh garlic when things really demand it, but the stuff in jars, like so many other things in jars works just fine - and is both a lot less work, and a hell of a lot cheaper.
Advertisement
Most Commented on Slog
-
Hating People Doesn't Make Them Thinner by Jen Graves
-
Los Angeles Gay Bar Bans Bachelorette Parties Until Marriage Equality Is Attained by David Schmader
-
Fill in the Blank by Grant Brissey
-
This Reminds Me of the Great Calculator Scare of the Late '70s/Early '80s by David Schmader
-
Idiot Tries to Defend Bigoted Anti-Gay-Marriage Preacher on Anderson Cooper by Paul Constant
-
Six Moms with Too Much Time on Their Hands and a Shitty Website Decide to Fight Gay Superheroes by Paul Constant
-
What the Hell Is Wrong With Seattle's Pride Parade? by Dominic Holden
-
The Saturday Morning News by Unpaid Intern
-
Why Mayor McGinn's Wife Canceled Her Family's Seattle Times Subscription by Eli Sanders
-
The Sunday Morning News by Unpaid Intern
RSS
Facebook
Twitter
Comments (42) RSS