In many ways, it can actually be attributed with beginning my love of food.
It was an adoration LONG in the making, and with a few pitfalls here and there, however.
Let me explain.
As most young suburban kids, I was first exposed to garlic in "common" things like pizza sauce and pasta sauce. Let's not forget garlic bread (which, to be fair, is really garlic salt). Basically Italian cooking. While positively loving the flavour of an extra-garlic-y alfredo sauce, my 8-year old counterpart would have given you a death-glare for putting serving some roasted garlic with a beautiful grilled steak.
Anyway, growing up, my mother never really liked garlic (still doesn't really), and I can't ever remember ever having anything more than garlic powder in the house. It's a shame, but that is probably why no one in my family really developed a solid love for it as much as I did. Needless to say, once I moved away I began to startle them with my exorbitant use of fresh, delicious, garlic.
It has taken some time, but I am now such a fan, I can surprise and delight by popping raw cloves in like candy.
It doesn't hurt that this shit is SO freakin good for you too!
Anyway, if you've been reading this blog at all, I'm sure you'll agree that I put garlic in almost everything that I can. And in shocking quantities.
I think it is such a robust, spicy, earthy flavour that actually brings out the best of everything you pair it with.
<Sigh>, I love you garlic!
:X
I go through at least one bulb a week, some times two. So much that I don't have to keep them in the fridge as many people do... which you're actually not really supposed to do. Much of the flavour leeches out in the cool temperature, and it is recommended to just store at room temperature in a dark place. So i have a garlic keeper which sits on my counter-top all the time.
It's handy!
