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After yesterday’s first post in my series, the 52 Weeks of Bad A** Bacteria, where I featured lactofermented garlic, I had a couple questions from readers about what they should do with the garlic once it’s fermented.
Long story short, you can use it in anything that you would normally put garlic in. Keep in mind that if you add it to cooked dishes, you will lose the probiotic benefit of it, but it still has an awesome flavor, so that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The fermenting process of the garlic mellows the cloves by removing some of the heat but enhancing the flavor.
To obtain all of the probiotic and nutritional goodness from your lactofermented garlic, you should add it to anything that is not cooked like dips, salad dressings, salsa, chutney, cold salads, cold vegetable dishes, etc. You can also take it medicinally and just eat a clove with each meal, but I know not many people might want to do that.
Here are some recipes that would be great with the addition of the pickled garlic. When the recipe calls for garlic powder, you can use approximately the same amount of you fresh garlic, depending on your tastes. Dried garlic is going to be more concentrated, so you might find that you need a little extra fresh garlic to get the same flavor. You can either mince it very fine, grate it, or whiz it up in a food processor.
Salad Dressings, Dips, and Condiments
- Better Than Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing
- Greek Yogurt Vegetable Dip
- Moroccan Vinaigrette
- Pickled Roasted Red Peppers
- Homemade Enchilada Sauce
- Onion-Cranberry Compote
- Savory Hummus
- Homemade Hot Sauce
Salads, Soups, and Sides
- Simple Garlicky Asparagus Spears
- Sautéed Chard with Onions and Garlic
- Quinoa Salad with Pomegranate
- Cucumber Salad With Sour Cream
- French Onion Soup
- Thai Chicken Coconut Soup
Main Dishes
- Super Simple Lemon Garlic Herb Roast Chicken
- French Chicken
- Pakistani Kima (Beef Curry)
- Chicken and Rice
- Oven BBQ Chicken
These are just a few recipes where you can include your pickled garlic. Remember, anything where you’d normally use garlic, whether dried or fresh, you can use the pickled garlic in the recipe. I’ll be using this garlic in all of my cooking from now on, as well as using it in future fermented and cultured dishes I do as part of my year long series.
So, have you made any pickled garlic? What is your favorite way to serve it? Have you been brave enough to just eat the clove whole? Share your favorite recipes in the comments below. I’d love to hear from you!
Stay tuned for next week’s fermented food. Remember, I’ll be featuring a different fermented or cultured food every single week in 2012! I look forward to hearing your thoughts, comments, ideas, etc.
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Whoa I almost missed the original lacto-fermented garlic post. Need to get on both of them!
Yikes! Don’t let it happen again, Mike! 🙂
I hope you enjoy! I’m up to 15 garlic cloves in two days. Kinda embarrassed to admit that. Pretty sure I’m going to to work tomorrow and people are going to steer clear of me! Hubby might also make me sleep in a different room! Ha!
Would you still get the probiotic benefit in say, spaghetti sauce or chili if you crushed it in at serving time and then just stirred it, rather than cooking it in?
Hi Lisa – If you heat it very high, it’s going to lose it’s probiotic benefits. I would try to find ways to incorporate it into a meal raw, or only slightly heated. The brine makes an excellent addition to salad dressings too! 🙂
For the last 7 years I have been using raw crushed garlic (with meat to make it more palatable) as a remedy for infections, usually on top of anti biotics because of its antimicrobial properties.
I guess the fermentation process will knock that aspect out. I found that usually the antibiotics alone wouldn’t totally knock out the infection, but when used in combination with garlic the job was done, particularly with pneumonia, continuing with the garlic for about 5 days longer than the antibiotics. IE the antibiotics alone resulted in the return of the problem, usually within weeks.
When combined with garlic, I wouldn’t have another bout for a year to 18 months. I have 2 lots of garlic brewing at the moment, well one is brewing, and the other i thinking about it, although the bubbles indicate something is happening, but it ain’t bubbling through the airloc, although I used the same starter, from sauerkraut, and the same salt water. Ditto that for the red onions, whilst the ordinary onions are merrily bubbling away.
When I read the post, about the garlic starter, I immediately thought “why particularly garlic”?
Hi Snoekie – The fermentation process does not remove the germ-fighting abilities of the garlic. As a matter of fact, it improves it, as you now have the benefits of the probitics too. The main benefit of fermentation of garlic (other than the probiotics) is that it removes some of the heat of raw garlic and makes it more palatable for those with sensitive mouths. Garlic is such an amazing natural remedy and the fermentation process only makes it better! 🙂
I made a batch over a year ago, kinda forgot about them, tasted them, and they taste even better; less sharp. They are great sliced really thinly and put on a sandwich or sub.
YUM! I have some in my fridge that is almost 2 years old and they still taste amazing! 🙂
Great addition to our probiotic arsenal (ginger bug, sauerkraut, milk kefir, pickles, asparagus)
Question is, must the fermented garlic be sliced or crushed for 10 minutes before eating to release the allicin like fresh garlic?
Hi Dan! Yes, this garlic is amazing! In regards to crushing or slicing it, I’ve never come across that in my research on fermented garlic so I honestly don’t know! Thanks for stopping by!