Roasted Garlic and the Breast

Wherein Mr Ullman professes his love for roasted garlic while Mr Broman appears to express some doubts.

Chicken breast. This isn't that sort of Blog.

There is nothing bad to be said about roasted garlic. I eat it alone. I spread it on crackers. I use it on salads. I have used it on fish, beef, pork, lamb, potatoes and corn. Should someone start a religion that worships roasted garlic I will be the first to the baptistry pool.

Let's start with roasting the garlic because this is where heaven is announced. This is the very definition of simple.

Heat your oven to 400 F.

Remove the outer layer of skin – the packaging so to speak – so that the individual cloves, still in their skins, are exposed.

Chop the top ¼ inch off the top of the cloves.

Drizzle olive oil on the heads of cloves. Don't over do it but make sure each clove is covered. By the way, feel free to go crazy here. I have used seed oils, nut oils, veggie oils. I have yet to meet a oil that that garlic didn't like.

Place the garlic into a muffin pan (or, if you are like me and view baking as someone else's problem, a cupped bit of aluminum foil).

Bake for 30-35 minutes until the cloves are soft.

Let those suckers cool enough to touch-- if you raise a blister it is to soon.

Reserve two cloves to be spread on wheat cracker or if you have a date – sorry about that, it is not that sort of blog (as an aside of you are blending it with mayo make certain the mayo is allowed to get to room temperature).

Create bread crumbs. I usually just toast some bread and crush it into fine chunks and dust. In this case I used whole wheat since I didn't want the bread fighting with the garlic.

Chop up some leeks, a bit of mint and mushrooms as finely as possible and toss them into a bowl with the bread crumbs. Throw is some thyme just for the hell of it. A zest would be good too but I haven't tried that yet. Toss.

I should have mentioned that this should all be done while the garlic was roasting. However, I got distracted.

While the garlic is still warm squeeze the garlic out its skin and rub it on the boneless chicken breast . I use about two cloves per side and only leave a few chunks behind. Put the breading mix into a plastic bag, throw in the chicken breast and shake vigorously so that the chicken if fully covered.

Heat the oven back to 400 F. Cook for thirty minutes, 15 on aside. I usually serve with coleslaw for no particular reason.