Pesky garlic

It's so not a secret, but when cooking for myself, I do everything possible to find a shortcut. However, I'm aware that sometimes the easiest way isn't the best. Hence, my dilemma - I love garlic but it's so much effort to cut it up all the time and usually I opt for either dry, minced garlic or what I call "semi-fresh" garlic.

Being perfectly honest, dry garlic is seriously lacking in flavor when compared to the real thing but it's just right there in it's little jar ready to go. Just use twice as much! Semi-fresh garlic, is what I have termed the stuff that comes pre-minced in a jar, it's moist and it needs to be kept in the fridge. It's better than the dried stuff but still a poor substitute for the real thing and it requires the use of a spoon. I mean another dish to wash?!?

A couple of years back, my beef was the amount of time it took to peel garlic. Then I read (somewhere...?) that if you pop it in the microwave for 2-3 seconds to warm it up the peeling will slip right off! And what do you know, it does! Don't put it in longer than 2-3 seconds, it gets hot really quickly.

Recently, I haven't been feeling like expending the effort to slice/mince the garlic. I'm lazy, I know. Then I saw a niffty looking trick on thekitchn. Use a fork! It's recommended by thekitchn when you're mincing only 1-2 cloves. I haven't tried it for more than that but I probably will, when I have more than that to mince. Keep in mind this technique will not get you equally sized pieces of garlic perfection but do you really care? I sure as hell don't.


Sorry for the less than fabulous photo, my camera ran out of batteries!

So there you have it - 2 tips leading to garlic perfection.