When you want a dish to have quintessential garlic flavor that permeates each bite, mince it. You can mince with a knife, or a garlic press.
Either way, you need to free the individual cloves. To do that, press down on the head with the heel of your palm. Apply firm, even pressure so the cloves don't fly all over the place.
To peel an individual clove, cut of the hard stem end where the clove attached to the bulb. Either stop the cut just short of the skin on the other side and peel the skin around to remove it, or make the cut all the way through and squeeze out the clove. The older the clove, the easier the skin releases.
You can also peel it by setting the side of your knife blade on the clove and pressing down until you feel the skin release, though not hard enough to pulverize it, or the skin will get mixed in with the garlic.
To mince with a knife, smash the peeled clove with the side of the knife. Then just run your knife back and forth across the smashed clove, chopping as you go until it's as fine as you like.
If you don't want individual little pieces of garlic and have a press, just put the whole peeled clove (or cloves, if you can fit them) in the press and squeeze. Use your knife to trim away any clinging garlic.
What does it mean to let the butter's foam subside?
What does it mean to let the butter's foam subside?
Certain phrases have become part of the recipe vernacular despite giving little in the way of good guidance. Most of us, for example, have seen something like this in recipes that call for cooking with butter:
“Melt the butter over medium-high heat in a medium saucepan. When the foam subsides, add the vegetables and stir.”
Why does the butter's foam need to subside?
It’s an indicator of temperature. Adding vegetables or meat to cold fat is a fast way to mess up a good dish. The ingredients soak up the butter rather than cook in it, and the finished dish can turn out excessively buttery and too moist on the surface. Hot fat, on the other hand, prevents sticking and encourages browning.
Letting the butter's foam subside before adding ingredients ensures a hot cooking environment and adds a rich flavor to the dish. Of course, butter is hot well before its foam subsides. In some dishes like soups, where you're sweating vegetables, you may not want that extra richness. In these cases, you're looking for the point at which the butter begins to foam.
But if a recipe does call for you to let the butter's foam subside, here's a rough guide:
Heat 2 tablespoons of butter over medium-high heat. Swirl the butter around in the pan. The milk solids will begin to separate out. The butter will sizzle and foam.
After another minute or so the foam subsides. The butter looks more like oil now, and it’s hot. At this point you might add eggs for an omelette.
For something like a sage butter sauce, let the butter go another 30 seconds or so to let it brown and take on a slightly nutty flavor. Like olive oil, butter has a low smoke point, so watch it closely. You don't want it to burn and smoke. If it does, rinse and dry the pan, then start over.
Recipe: Tortellini With Sage, Brown Butter, And Parmesan (Cookthink)
Related: Root Source: Unsalted Butter (Cookthink)
what you should know
If it's ugly, the old produce adage goes, it must be good. Nothing proves this so convincingly as the subsoil family of dark taproots, homeliest among them the beet.
The beet may not be much to look at on the outside, but what really defines it is the sweetness of its flesh, which is usually a vibrant red, yellow or orange.
Its high sugar content and hardiness have made it a fiber-rich workhorse in northern climates such as the Ukraine, whose national dish is the beet-based soup called borscht. (The family of America's most famous beet farmer, Dwight Schrute, came from Germany.)
keep the beet Stay away from beets that are soft or that have wet or bruised spots. You want smooth, firm beets. In the refrigerator, they'll keep for a month or so. Before cooking, gently scrub the beets. To prevent them from "bleeding," wait until after you've cooked and let them cool a little before you peel them.
it's chard When you can, buy beets with the tops still attached. When you get them home, lop off all but a half inch or so of the greens and store them separately. Cook the greens just like you would chard, which is actually a beet that's been bred as a leaf vegetable.
what you need
Peeling with the OXO 7" Good Grips swivel peeler is like writing with your favorite pen. With its thick grip, you can get an easy peel that doesn't maul the beet. (It won't keep your hands from staining pink, though. If soap doesn't get it out, try lemon juice.)
n her book Chez Panisse Vegetables, Alice Waters lets beets and other roots shine with as little embellishment as possible. We endorse this.
For borscht, you've got to have a good loaf of locally made bread. At my local market, I buy fresh rye made by Holyoke's El Jardín Bakery. Slice it, toast it and drizzle it with butter or oil. Or just tear a chunk off for sopping.
what you do
You can do no wrong by simply roasting beets. (Wrapping or covering them in foil makes them easier to peel). While they're still warm, peel and toss them with quality vinegar. Waters insists that the vinegar highlights the sweetness of the beets. We agree.
That sweetness is the perfect canvas for playing around with contrasting flavors. Grate raw beets and toss them in a salad with frisee, walnuts and creamy fresh goat cheese.
Depending on where you find yourself in the world, borscht (or barszcz or bartsch or bors) can range from a cold, light broth to a hot, meaty stew. Here's a delicious but simple vegetarian borscht.
