Glut of onions and garlic - any cool ideas?

[Sway]

As per title really, new allotment holders, first season growing.

We've done OK! Likely a year's worth of onion and garlic...

Dried for the last fortnight in the greenhouse, so could easily plait and hang in our frost free garage. However, I've also just bought a big upright freezer for the garage, and it's sitting empty - so am going to do some 'oil/onion/garlic' cubes to freeze and then just throw a few into a pan when doing a quick midweek meal.

Any other thoughts? I did hear about slow roasting the garlic and storing in oil in jars - but also heard botulism can arise, which did put me off a tad...

[craigthecoupe]

base curry gravy?

[thebraketester]

https://www.bobbiskozykitchen.com/2015/03/chicken-...

[Zag_a_muffin]

Roasted then frozen, has the advantage of making your house smell fantastic. Also garlic pickle, think lime pickle but with garlic, no idea how to make it but a great side to a curry.

[warp9]

Smoke the garlic. Store in a cool, dark, dry place. Total yum with anything!

[21TonyK]

You can confit the garlic, just peel and poach in oil at 80C for a couple of hours. Soft and very mellow garlic flavour, brilliant smeared onto griddled bread or in dressings, sauces etc I do a kilo at a time, keeps for a month or so in oil in the fridge.

Onion soup freezes well.

[dontlookdown]

Puree some of the onions and freeze. Great base for curry pastes of all kinds. Could also do the same with some garlic.

High quality problem!

[bern]

Great recipe here for a curry base.

https://youtu.be/LOn9wkjLpCc

Whatever you do though don't waste it. We've been guilty of that before. If you aren't going to use it all give some away to friends and family.

[Sway]

Some absolutely cracking ideas here, thanks!

Definitely won't be wasting any - way, way too much time and hard work went into them... "Worst" case, I'll use a hundred cloves in a single dish!! Family have already been gifted some, we think we've about a year's worth kept.

Definitely doing some curry base. Probably won't do puree for storage, as I think I'd be better off just doing a big batch of base and freezing it 'ready to go'.

With confit in oil at 80C - would I do that in something like a bain marie using my sous vide to control the temp?

Garlic pickle sounds intriguing! As does smoking some...

Current plan - dice/process enough for 'everyday cooking' and freeze in oil. Perfect for making my other half's life a bit easier as she has hypermobility and can dislocate joints purely through chopping onions/potatoes.

Batch of curry base.

Those two should make use of most/all the onions.

Garlic, I may have succeeded a little better than I expected! Which enables a bit of experimentation.

I'll do a trial of some confit and see how we like it - not something we've ever had I don't think. Same for the smoked garlic - I'll put some on when I next fire up the smoker for a joint of meat.

Edited by Sway on Sunday 15th August 08:51

[21TonyK]

Sway said:

With confit in oil at 80C - would I do that in something like a bain marie using my sous vide to control the temp?

I normally just chuck in in a bowl in the oven set to 80. Just preheat the oil a bit in a pan to give it a head start.

[Sway]

Was thinking that might be the way - my oven is utterly crap at low temp consistency!

I do have a wireless thermometer though I use for roasting/bbq, so could go with that to ensure it doesn't go out of kilter.

[HotJambalaya]

Sway said:

Some absolutely cracking ideas here, thanks!

Definitely won't be wasting any - way, way too much time and hard work went into them... "Worst" case, I'll use a hundred cloves in a single dish!!

In that case get this book

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Made-India-Britain-Recipe...

and look up the "100 garlic-clove curry" recipe. And yes, it is literally 100 cloves of garlic.

Its a pretty interesting book in general, not that I've made a huge amount in it, though that garlic recipe did ring a bell when I read that!

-they also have a garlic pickle recipe.

In fact, the quote at the bottom of the front cover says "This book is full of real charm, personality, love and garlic"


I also just remembered an LA restaurant called the Stinking Rose which is a super garlic restaurant, I just checked amazon and they have a cookbook too

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stinking-Rose-Restaurant-...

Funny story about that place, some friends of mine went for dinner there and had a flight the next day, they overheard the stewardesses chatting to each other, "i cant figure out where that garlic smell is coming from!!"

Edited by HotJambalaya on Sunday 15th August 12:33

[21TonyK]

This is fantastic and would use 10+ cloves every time...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/tandoori_chickp...

[Dibble]

A load of French onion soup would be my choice. Freeze it and use as required. Should last a few months at least.