If you`re one of those folks who think mashed potatoes, bread pudding and chocolate chip cookies are the epitome of comfort foods, think again.
”Garlic has become the ultimate comfort food,” says cookbook author and food critic Janet Hazen. ”Garlic`s incomparable smell and flavor provide nourishment for the heart and soul, as well as the body,” she says.
And while you`re turning to garlic for comfort (and for keeping vampires at bay), you might pick up Hazen`s latest little book called, appropriately,
”Garlic” (Chronicle, $9.95). It contains 28 selected recipes sure to sate almost any garlic lover`s garlic craving for the pungently flavored bulb.
How about roast chicken with 50-count them-50 cloves of garlic.
”Why stop at 40?” she asks. Or three-onion garlic soup with garlic-gorgonzola croutons? Or garlic-tomato jam?
Americans are fascinated with ”robust and complex flavors,” Hazen says, and garlic is increasingly used to help provide them.
”Garlic” includes a collection of garlic history and folklore, and the recipes are interspersed with garlic anecdotes, quotes and hints.
More Top Picks Best Kerosene Space Heaters
But Hazen leaves out one crucial suggestion: don`t be the only one at the table to indulge in this ”fragrant” bulb.