Garlic Confit
Published: July 26, 2023 .
This Garlic Confit is a delicious alternative to roasted garlic and once you’ve prepped the cloves most of the work is hands-off. Just pure, silky smooth, garlicky goodness!
Confit is a French slow-cooking technique that relies on the richness of fat to produce tender, flavourful meats and vegetables. For this recipe I call for high quality extra-virgin olive oil with rich floral notes to slowly roast whole cloves.
Though this recipe features two of my favourite home-grown herbs – rosemary and thyme – you can customize the flavour notes to include any herbs or seasonings you like or omit them altogether. The result will be a sweeter, more mellow melt-in-your-mouth roasted garlic flavour that will upgrade just about any dish!
How to use garlic confit:
Both the garlic and garlic-infused oil are incredibly versatile. You can spread the buttery soft cloves on toast or garlic bread, add whole cloves to pizza, mix them into pastas or dips, mash them into butter or add them to roasted meats, broccoli, crispy potatoes or other vegetables.
The fragrant olive oil is ideal for dipping with a little balsamic or as a base for salad vinaigrettes + marinades. We love to bake garlic confit into my Rosemary & Roasted Garlic Artisan Bread and it is SO good spread on my Everyday Artisan Bread!
Garlic Confit
Makes 20 servings or about 1½ cups; prep time 15 minutes, cook time 2 hours.
Ingredients:
4-5 heads of garlic, cloves peeled and trimmed (about 2 cups)
5 or 6 fresh rosemary + thyme sprigs
1 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 250°F (121ºC) and prepare ingredients. *To make this tender, slow-roasted garlic in an hour, see stovetop instructions below.
Using a sharp knife, trim the ends then peel each garlic clove, leaving it intact and discarding any bruised cloves.
Place garlic and oil in a small oven-proof baking dish, adding a little more oil if cloves aren’t submerged, then top with fresh herbs. Bake for 2 hours until cloves are tender and lightly browned in colour.
Remove baking dish from oven and let cool completely. Once cooled, remove cloves from baking dish with a slotted spoon and place into a sterilized canning jar. Pour oil over cloves, seal tightly and refrigerate.
Notes:
Garlic cloves: Look for fresh heads of garlic with fewer, larger cloves. If pressed for time, accelerate peeling by trimming any hard ends then place cloves in a glass bowl and submerge them in boiling water. Let sit for 5 minutes, remove from water then rub off the skins with your fingers. Using this technique will not result in pre-cooking the garlic and the skins will loosen and slide right off.
Olive oil substitutes: Try using a neutral oil like avocado or canola!
Optional infusions: Bay leaves, black peppercorns, dried chilis or freshly grated lemon zest are all delicious alternatives.
Stovetop: Combine all of the ingredients in a medium saucepan and simmer over low heat until the garlic is tender but not browned, about 30 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool, then store as above.
Storage: Store garlic confit in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to two weeks or freeze it along with the infused oil in ice cube trays. If not using within two weeks, remove frozen cubes from tray and store in a freezer-safe bag or airtight container for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator overnight. *Note that garlic confit is low in acidity and must be kept chilled at all times to reduce the risk of food-borne illness.
