How To: Roast a Head of Garlic

False alarm on the Fourth — Braxton Hicks, the doctor said, which is the body rehearsing, which is an entirely reasonable thing for a body to do given what is coming. Shanice texted me Sunday to say she was fine and that she had made oxtails on Saturday after the whole thing, which I find completely correct and which CJ said he was not sure what to make of. I said: she was reminding herself and her body who was in charge. CJ said, should I be worried? I said, you should be impressed. He said, fair enough.

Six weeks. Summer is at its hottest and the garden is at its most demanding and I am in the kitchen every day in the early hours before the heat takes over. Preserving season: the tomatoes are coming in faster than I can use them fresh and so I have been putting them up — tomato preserves, stewed tomatoes in jars, a big batch of tomato sauce that I freeze in quarts. This is the work that makes winter survivable. You put the summer up in jars in July so that in January you can open a jar of tomato sauce and it still smells like the garden in high season, still carries the heat and the sweetness of the specific summer that produced it.

I thought this week about all the things I am going to teach Caleb. Not in a formal sense — he will be a baby and then a toddler and the teaching will be mostly accidental for years. But eventually: how to make gravy. How to know when a cast iron is ready. Why you always put the beans in before the lid goes on. How to read a pot by sound and smell. These are not small things. These are the inheritance, and I am the one in position to pass them. I have time. I have exactly the right amount of time.

The tomatoes go into jars, the sauce goes into the freezer, and in between all of it I keep coming back to the small things — the techniques that don’t require a recipe so much as they require someone to show you once, and then trust you to remember. Roasting a head of garlic is one of those. It’s the kind of thing I can already picture walking Caleb through someday: the smell when it comes out of the oven, the way the cloves press out soft and gold and sweet, the understanding that patience is an ingredient. It belongs in every kitchen that takes itself seriously, right alongside the tomatoes in the pantry.

Prep Time: 5 min | Cook Time: 45 min | Total Time: 50 min | Servings: 1 head (about 10–12 cloves)

Ingredients

1 whole head of garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons olive oil
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
Pinch of black pepper
1 sheet aluminum foil (about 12 inches square)

Instructions

Preheat. Heat your oven to 400°F. No need to wait for a rack position — center rack works fine.
Prep the head. Peel away the loose, papery outer layers of the garlic bulb, leaving the head intact and the individual clove skins in place. Using a sharp knife, slice off the top 1/4 inch of the head to expose the tops of the individual cloves.
Season. Place the garlic head cut-side up on the center of your foil sheet. Drizzle the olive oil directly over the exposed cloves, letting it settle down between them. Season with salt and pepper.
Wrap. Fold the foil up and around the garlic head, crimping it closed at the top to form a sealed packet. The steam inside is what finishes the cloves — don’t skip a good seal.
Roast. Place the foil packet directly on the oven rack or on a small baking sheet. Roast for 40–45 minutes, until the cloves feel soft and yielding when you press the outside of the foil packet gently. If you’re unsure, open the foil and test with a toothpick — it should slide in with no resistance.
Cool and squeeze. Remove from the oven and let the packet rest, still sealed, for 10 minutes. Open carefully — the steam is hot. To use, hold the base of the head and squeeze or press the individual cloves out from the bottom. They will slide out soft, golden, and spreadable.
Use or store. Spread onto bread, stir into tomato sauce, mash into butter, or mix into salad dressing. Store any unused cloves in a small jar covered with olive oil in the refrigerator for up to one week.

Nutrition (per serving — 1 whole head)

How To: Roast a Head of Garlic — The Foundation You Put Up Before Winter