Individual cloves of garlic are incased in a protective skin. Up to a dozen or more cloves can be attached to form a single head. To separate the individual cloves, place the head on the cutting board with the stem side up and the root or wood side down. Use your two hands to press down hard on the head until it breaks apart with an audible crack. While some skin will come off, most of the cloves will remain encased in their own covering.
Peel away any loose papery skin and discard it. Pile the cloves neatly to the side. It’s always important to keep your cutting board as clean and free our clutter as you can. Make it a habit to remove from your board anything you’re not using immediately.
To remove the skin, place he cloves one at a time on the cutting board, lay the side of the knife blade on the clove with the knife edge facing away from you and angled slightly toward the board. Use the heel of your hand of the side of your fist and give one of two light wraps on the top of the blade just enough to crack and loosen the skin but not so much that you crush the clove itself. Remove and discard the skin and place the peeled clove off to the side. Repeat this with as many cloves as you’re using.
Use your knife to remove the top and unpalatable bottom of each clove. One at a time, place a clove in the center of the board and place the side of the blade back on top. For safety, keep the knife edge facing away from you and angled slightly toward the board. Once again, using the heel of your palm or the side of your fist, give a sharp wrap on the blade. This time, use enough force to flatten the clove completely. Wipe any pieces of garlic from the knife blade and set the flatten clove aside. Gather the flattened cloves together and hold them in place with your guide hand in a claw position.
With the side of the blade against your guide fingers, make a series of cuts across the pile of cloves. Gather the pieces together and repeat this process several times to reduce the cloves to finely chopped pieces. Gather the pieces in a small pile and pace your knife on top. Anchor the tip of your blade with your guide hand, then rocking the blade up and down, fan the blade back and forth across the pile. Scrape the pile back together as it spreads out and continue cutting. Notice how the fingers on the guide hade slide up and out away from the blade, keeping them safely out of harm away. Pause occasionally to scrape bits of garlic from he blade, then continue on till the garlic is reduced to a fine paste.
This process can take several minutes of chopping. Pay attention to the changing texture of the garlic as it is transformed from chopped cloves to a fine paste. Just when you think you can’t chopped the garlic any finer, gather into a pile and sprinkle it with some course or Kosher salt. As you continue chopping, the salt will help pound the larger pieces into a paste. Later, when you’re coking with this garlic, remember that you’ve added salt.
When the garlic is reduced to a finely minced pulp, flip your knife one quarter turn in your hand so that your thumb is now resting on the opposite side of the blade and all four fingers are curled around the handle. Place the spine of the knife on the cutting board with the blade facing out at about 45 degree angle. Take the index and middle fingers of your guide hand and place them on the same side of the blade as your thumb, further down toward the tip. Push the garlic forward with the spine, then pivot the knife blade down and pull back smashing the garlic with the edge of the blade. This technique is called creaming, let the middle and index fingers of your guide hand do the work of pushing down the blade while you use your knife hand to control the knife’s movement across the cutting board. Continue creaming the garlic until all visible chunks are gone and you are left with a smooth paste. Remember to be patient while you’re doing this. The entire process from whole cloves to smooth paste can take anywhere from five to ten minutes.
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