Here's something new we tried last week: Trader Joe's Emperor's New Cloves Garlic - just one clove per head. We were curious about this - what does just one-clove garlic look like? We hate peeling garlic and the sticky juice that clings to our fingers and the knife, so this looked very appealing. See more pictures and our thoughts below...
It looks like this garlic has been bred so that the cloves have very little separation; you can still see their distinct ridges, but there is no papery skin between them.
I found that this garlic was much milder and sweeter than the garlic I usually buy. An entire head (err... clove) did not punch up a roast as much as I expected it to.
No, this garlic really shines when it's roasted. When you roast it you get an entire head of oozy garlic goodness, without the papery skins to squeeze and fuss over. This is Trader Joe's selling pitch with this variety, and it's highly recommended for this purpose!
Just drizzle some olive oil and crack some salt and pepper over top. Wrap in foil and bake at 375F for about an hour and serve with fresh bread or crackers and some soft cheese. The purple-striped papery skin makes a beautiful presentation.
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Kind of neat but hard to translate into actual recipe use. Is there a conversion factor on the package?
view sally599's profile
Looks tasty! I wonder if this is like elephant garlic, and not a true garlic, botanically speaking.
view Julie's profile
how much does it cost? that little basket looks pricey!
view Married ...with Dinner's profile
I am skeptical but intrigued. I love to have roasted garlic on hand at all times, so this might be worhtwhile for me.
view mjoe's profile
is this natural or has it been bred to be like that?
I'm also interested about recipe conversion-- wouldn't you end up with a lot more garlic than you can use at once?
view Eliza's profile
I too was seduced at TJs by this one giant clove of garlic...and think it's only really good for roasting.
Also, it's an import from China.
I try really really hard to buy local, and there's still local garlic at my farmer's market. I've stocked up.
view guido's profile
it's common in china and i thought it tasted just like the kind of garlic we use in N.A., if not better. too bad it isn't grown here much.
view woobeans's profile
Yeah it seems like it's only practical for roasting, but it would be really nice to not have to squeeze out all the little cloves when you're cooking and get all sticky. Too bad I can't justify it, I still have most of a braid of garlic from our last farmer's market two months ago. And it's definitely not from China.
view Anne (in Reno)'s profile
I've got tons of farm share garlic, so I'm not going to be in the market for fancy new garlics anytime soon. I've been interested, though, in the way the flavor of the garlic from my farm share changed over the season-- has anyone else noticed that or am I crazy?
view v in boston's profile
I'm guessing this was somehow bred the Mendel pea experiment way?
view foodiegirl's profile
I just bought this, and in CA it's $1.49. However, I was turned off by the fact that it's from China too. How old is the garlic by the time it gets to the shelves, compared with garlic coming from CA? I'll stick to my farmer's market garlic, but this was fun to try. Why can't we grow that variety here in the US?
view alexarc's profile
I'm sure that if there's demand someone will grow it locally. As its the first time many of us here have seen it, and we're somewhat impressed (aside from those who worry about breeding), I imagine demand will increase.
Cheers!
view SeanG's profile