A guy at work who grows garlic commercially was selling it for $10/kg. It was pretty good quality, just the same as the garlic that is $30/kg at the shops, so I bought 2 kg of it. We weren't sure how well it would keep, so we decided to dry it.
We spent about an hour peeling 1 kg of the garlic and laid the individual cloves on the tray of our dehydrator. We ran the dehydrator on and off for several days until the cloves were no longer sticky. I then whizzed them all in the food processor to for granules. We dried the granules on baking paper in the dehydrator for another day. This produced about half a jar of granules. As this translates to 1 kg of garlic, I imagine that they will be rather strong!
We are going to use up the rest of the fresh garlic first, and then use the granules. During winter we often find that the Australian garlic runs out and we have to buy Chinese or Mexican garlic, so I hope this year we will be able to stretch all this garlic through the entire year. I did try to grow it, but I think I kept the soil too moist. I will keep trying.....
We spent about an hour peeling 1 kg of the garlic and laid the individual cloves on the tray of our dehydrator. We ran the dehydrator on and off for several days until the cloves were no longer sticky. I then whizzed them all in the food processor to for granules. We dried the granules on baking paper in the dehydrator for another day. This produced about half a jar of granules. As this translates to 1 kg of garlic, I imagine that they will be rather strong!
We are going to use up the rest of the fresh garlic first, and then use the granules. During winter we often find that the Australian garlic runs out and we have to buy Chinese or Mexican garlic, so I hope this year we will be able to stretch all this garlic through the entire year. I did try to grow it, but I think I kept the soil too moist. I will keep trying.....
Have you made garlic granules? What do you like to dehydrate?
I bet your hands smelt strong after peeling all that garlic. I only peeled one clove tonight and they still smell of it!
ReplyDeleteyes the whole house smelt like garlic, it made me hungry :)
DeleteI'll be very interested to know how you go through the year with this method as I wouldn't mind having another form up my sleeve for the gap in spring.
ReplyDeleteI bet that it smelled really nice during that process, some people don't like the smell but I love it. You guys came up with a good idea!
ReplyDeleteOh that sounds very useful. Sometimes things seem a lot of work, but then once you have that all done and so easy to use you will find it was worth the effort.
ReplyDeleteyes exactly, and it was so hot, it was worth spending an hour in the air con peeling garlic!
DeleteFreezing works well too. I have a container of cloves in the freezer (skin and all) and simply pull one out when I need it and chop or grate. I haven't noticed a difference between it fresh or frozen.
ReplyDeleteI imagine those granules smell delicious.
oh freezer is a good idea and would have been way quicker....
DeleteWe use a HUGE amount of garlic and aside from attempting to battle the wallabies (who ADORE anything allium :( ) I am always on the lookout for good quality garlic. It IS very expensive and if I could find it for $10 a kilo I would be on it. This is a really interesting tutorial and if I can ever get enough, I will give it a go :)
ReplyDeleteGenius! I never even notice the price of garlic but seem to be able to get NZ garlic all year round so I just buy one or two bulbs at a time and keep it in the fridge. I tried to grow it once and it started alright but then shriveled into nothing and disappeared. Haven't tried it again.
ReplyDeleteThat's a fab idea, I would never have thought to do that... I will have to try that :)
ReplyDeleteWhat a good idea. It will be really good to have that powder on hand, I'm sure.
ReplyDeleteGarlic...yum :) But I bet your fingers still taste of the stuff even now!
ReplyDeleteGlad it was helpful, I will report back when our garlic supply runs out and I have to crack open the jar of granules :)
ReplyDelete