Uses for a bowl full of sprouty garlic?

spend_thrift

I bought a couple of baskets of single bulb garlic when they were on offer in Lidl a couple of weeks ago, and stored them in my new kitchen cupboard. I never have a problem with garlic stored in my old cupboard, but I think this new one is darker and gets opened less... anyway I was horrified to see that in less than a fortnight about 14 bulbs had sprouted! :eek:

I already have garlic growing in the garden and not really any space to plant any more, so I was wondering what to do with the sprouty bulbs. Can I just chop off the tops and use them as normal? I want to do something to halt their growth as at the moment they're still firm and plump, but as they grow more they're not going to remain as tasty.

Any ideas? Any recipes for one that use a shedload of garlic? :rolleyes:

bigmuffins

Best thing is to grow it on - stick in pots if no more space in garden but if don't want to do that, peel and stick in freezer. Either whole or crushed, don't chop off the green bits - they are fine to eat. In fact, we often pick young garlic and use the leaves and bulb in dishes. Get a lovely mild garlic flavour. Use for cooking straight from freezer.
:money: Nice crushed in mortar and pestle and added to sour cream to make a garlic and sour cream dip or topping for baked potatoes - the green bits look lovely and taste fab!
:beer:

ariba10

As bigmuffins said Plant the individual cloves.

Traditionally it is planted on the shortest day and harvested on the longest day

spend_thrift

These are single clove bulbs - they're just one big clove about the size of a small shallot. They're from China so I have no idea how they'd do in our climate and since they're from the supermarket I would be concerned that they're not disease-free.

I'd rather find a recipe I can use them in as I have a stack of garlic growing already in my garden.

Firebird

Hi spend_thrift, I think it a type of garlic called elephant garlic(seriously). I roasted some of mine in the oven then froze in tablespoon sized quantities for use later. The last three I had sprouted about a week ago but I sliced around the shoot and used them anyway and they were fine.

foxgloves

A while ago, I remember seeing a cookery programme which mentioned green garlic shoots costing a fortune on the London fruit & veg markets, so I should chop them up & use them in pasta & stuff. The bulbs are probably OK too, as long as they look like normal garlic colour inside and not brown and weird or anything.

Apricot

I just usually pull the green sprouting bits off and eat as usual. The longer you leave it the bigger the sprouts will get so I would just cut it all up and crush - pop in an ice cube tray in the freezer & then you have easily accessible garlic for recipes.

CCP

I generally use garlic after it's sprouted - I either cut the sprout off or just chuck it in with the rest (depending how lazy I'm feeling ). I've never noticed that the sprouts taste any different but, like you, I try to use sprouting garlic asap so it doesn't get the chance to change flavour, really.

If you want to use it all up in one go, I seem to remember that there's a French dish that uses something like 40 cloves of garlic. I've never been brave enough to try it myself, but it would certainly get rid of your supplies! Mmm... garlic chicken...

carolinosourus

I like the idea about roasting it and freezing it.

Could you make garlic-infused olive oil? Or make a huge batch of tomato passata/base sauce for pizza, bolognese etc then freeze it??

BexInLondon

Delia has a recipe for 40 garlic chicken that's pretty yummy!

spend_thrift

That sounds pretty good - at least I'd be immune to vampires after a portion of that!