Roasting garlic mellows its sharp flavor and brings out its sweet tones. If you’ve never tasted garlic that has been roasted, treat yourself after making this recipe by smearing some of it over a hot piece of toasted French bread and sprinkling with a little bit of coarse salt. That something so simple can taste so heavenly is one of those miracles that makes me happy to have chosen the profession of chef.–Kevin Garvin
LC Roast Garlic Galore Note
There are, clearly, countless applications for this almost effortless, wholly luscious condiment, no matter how romance-averting they may be. Should you crave a smidgen of inspiration, take a gander below the recipe, where our gallivanting and garlic-loving recipe testers divulged their go-to uses. Special thanks to veteran tester Elsa Jacobson, who alone contributed 100 of these inspired ideas. But don’t let that stop you from sharing yours.
Roasted Garlic Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 large head garlic
Directions
- 1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (176°C).
- 2. Cut the head of garlic in half horizontally but leave the two cut sides facing one another. Wrap the head loosely in foil, place in a small baking dish, and transfer to the oven. Roast for 45 minutes.
- 3. Unwrap the garlic and squeeze the roasted cloves into a bowl. Let cool to room temperature. (You can reserve it in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a week. If desired, cover the garlic with a little olive oil.) Use as you see fit. Stumped? Take a cue from any of the below…
Hungry for more? Chow down on these:
- Chili Garlic Paste from ECurry
- Garlic Butter Roasted Mushrooms from Smitten Kitchen
- Dandelion Greens and Garlic Cooked in Duck Fat from Leite's Culinaria
- Spaghetti with Wild Garlic and Herbs from Leite's Culinaria
Make roasted garlic your bitch by:
- Swirl into risotto
- Toss with roasted baby carrots
- Mix with steamed green beans
- Smear under the skin of to-be-roasted chicken
- Whisk into vinaigrettes and dressings
- Mix with steamed green beans
- Slather on lamb along with fresh herbs
- Stir into vichyssoise (just a touch)
- Whisk into pasta sauce (marinara, alfredo, or otherwise)
- Whiz into olive tapenade
- Blitz into olive-basil pesto
- Smear on bread, sprinkle with Parmesan, and bake or broil
- Whip into chèvre
- Dabble atop arugula salad
- Sauté with mushrooms
- Slather on slice of crusty bread
- Fold into compound butter
- Spread on toast
- Sprinkle atop a baked potato
- Whip into a twice-baked potato
- Blend into mashed potatoes
- Spread into a grilled cheese sandwich
- Infuse into vegetable or fish marinades
- Scramble into eggs
- Sizzle into a stir-fry
- Alternate with sauce, noodles, and cheese in lasagna
- Layer into eggplant Parmesan
- Whip into cream cheese (and use to accompany bagels..and lox.)
- Smother baked brie
- Swirl into French or Italian bread dough before baking
- Sprinkle atop foccacia
- Dab atop pizza
- Whip into a frittata
- Snuggle into an omelet
- Sauté with onions in hash browns
- Dab adjacent to Caprese salad
- Whisk into onion dip
- Strew atop nachos
- Stuff into pitted olives
- Slather on anything at Thanksgiving
- Smear on a burger
- Meld into soup
- Garnish a gazpacho
- Stir into chili
- Frizzle into fajitas
- Toss with sautéed spinach
- Throw into the pan with oven-roasted vegetables
- Stuff in chile rellenos
- Melt into mac ‘n cheese
- Sneak into guacamole
- Fold into hummus
- Add to baba ghanouj
- Scatter over asparagus (steamed, roasted, or grilled)
- Slip into samosa filling
- Blend into mayo for an aioli of sorts
- Use in place of raw garlic anywhere
- Dot on hot dogs
- Smear inside a wrap
- Stuff into a pita sandwich
- Blend into BBQ sauce
- Smear inside a quesadilla
- Crush into artichoke and spinach dip
- Dish up with cheese and crackers
- Nuzzle it up to sliced tomatoes
- Stuff into baked stuffed zucchini
- Strew atop cold sesame noodles
- Blend into yogurt sauce or in raita
- Daub on flatbread
- Cradle eggs Florentine on an English muffins
- Bake into biscuits
- Dump into corn bread batter
- Dribble over baked corn bread
- Roll inside a burrito
- Immerse with marinated cheese
- Massage into labneh or yogurt cheese
- Jumble it in with three bean salad
- Spooned aside, atop, or mixed into roasted red peppers
- Jazz up butter for corn on the cob
- Scatter over panzanella
- Roll into sushi
- Stuff into pierogi
- Fashion into a sauce for grilled fish or grilled meat
- Dress up a chicken sandwich
- Squeeze it into mushroom caps
- Bake it into Bulgarian gyuvetch
- Make it into pasta al olio with onions, roasted garlic & herbs
- Mash into refried beans
- Add to baked beans
- Slip into spanakopita
- Jumble into chilaquiles
- Mix into migas
- Slather on a tostada
- Serve alongside pickles
- Add to tahini sauce and serve with falafel or Jerusalem salad
- Add to caramelized onions (at the end)
- Stir into a green bean casserole
- Slip into rice pilaf
- Mix into ranch dressing
- Stirred into Thousand Island dressing
- Added to turkey stuffing
- Stir-fry with Szechwan eggplant, green beans, or broccoli
- Toss with pad Thai
- Mash into mole
- Make into pasta salad
- Sex up some salsa
- Put in potato salad
- Slather over grilled vegetables
- Eat by itself on a spoon, fork, or knife
Roasted Garlic Recipe © 2007 Kevin Garvin. Photo © 2007 Ellen Silverman. All rights reserved.


[Brenda Carleton] This must be the world’s simplest “recipe” (or rather technique). Garlic becomes meltingly tender, sweet, and mellow as it roasts, and it is SO incredibly delicious in so many ways. I often add fresh herbs and a drizzle of olive oil in its little tin foil package.
[Jo Ann Brown] It’s great to revisit a dish that you know well. Someone else’s orchestration of how it should taste may make your old method(s) obsolete. Take this recipe for roasted garlic as an example. For seventeen years, I have been adding extra-virgin olive oil to the garlic head before roasting. Why, for all of these years? The garlic doesn’t need it — not a single drop. This version without the olive oil saves me calories (important!) AND tastes so much better. The garlic is sweeter and cleaner, and the slight acridness in my old preparation is gone. My tip: I use a serrated bread knife rather than a chef’s knife to cut the garlic horizontally. I get a nice, clean and accurate cut on the uneven surface.
[A. Lee] I think this tastes great. Even though it’s a very basic recipe, I think a lot of people don’t know how to do it. I generally don’t use a recipe and so was interested to see whether it works to use one.
[Cindy Z.] Most recipes for roasted garlic ask for olive oil and salt and pepper on the garlic before wrapping in foil and roasting. This one is just garlic alone. Can’t get any easier. Turned out absolutely sweet and delicious. Will definitely do it again this way
[Tamiko L.] Really, this is about as easy as can be and the uses for it are limitless. The garlic loses its pungent sharpness and becomes smooth, rich, and velvety, with a deep and robust garlic essence. I smeared this on pizza crust and topped with fig, prosciutto, rocket and Manchego for a light grilled pizza. I’m sure that a dollop in my next pasta sauce will gild the lily.
[Carol Anne G.] It’s not so much a recipe, as an opportunity to nail down the time it takes to roast a head of garlic. What I really liked was the suggestion to halve the bulb horizontally, which means you can remove the puree with a quick squeeze of each side, rather than clove by clove – this is a top tip. So far, it’s gone into olive tapenade and olive-basil pesto, and its lovely, mellow flavor has been much appreciated.
[Elsa M. Jacobson] A standard and a classic. I actually prefer to cut off only about a quarter inch or so, just to reveal the cloves inside: cutting it in half created one perfect half attached at the root, and one half that fell into pieces of exposed cloves, which nonetheless roasted well individually. Additionally, if you just cut off the very top, the roasted head of garlic makes a lovely presentation at the table, and your guests can squeeze the cloves out themselves. I also like to drizzle a bit of olive oil atop the garlic before roasting, with salt and pepper additional options. Once in the foil, I didn’t feel a need to also use a baking dish; however, one could place the cut head inside a baking dish and cover it with foil before roasting. A slightly smaller head of garlic might take a little less time, so watch it every so often past the half hour mark if you’re using a head of garlic that would be better described as medium. Conversely, elephant garlic works beautifully for this recipe: the extra-large cloves are easier to squeeze out, and they are moister, almost juicier, once roasted than their smaller counterparts. Once you’ve roasted garlic, the raw stuff can seem crass and harsh, while this is smooth, rich, and voluptuous. Nonetheless, it’s a gracious touch to have some parsley in the meal or alongside the garlic, to freshen any lingering garlic aftertaste before moving on to dessert or the rest of your evening.
[Abigail Corn] It’s too simple to be considered as a recipe, but I think it’s important for newcomers to find this information on the site. During spring and summer, when the garlic is fresh and at its best, we consume about five to 10 heads a week.
I love roasted garlic and it is so incredible how it transforms into something so sweet and luscious! Thank you for your lengthy list of ways to use it. I never thought of blending it with chevre but I will now.
Have you ever tried black garlic? Something about that gives me a horrible stomachache. Just wondering if that happens to anyone else?
You’re welcome, Vicki. I’ve recently stood and held black garlic in my hand at the market, tempted to buy it, but with it being summer I chose to wait until cooler weather. I’m even more curious to try it now…anyone else?
I posted about black garlic back in 2009 when it had just come out so maybe it’s different now. Back then you could only order it online which is what I did. I’ve noticed that they sell it in some supermarkets now.
Here’s their site for those curious about it.