Kitchen Tip - Minced-Ahead Garlic

I hate pulling out my garlic press and peeling the sticky little cloves every time I want fresh minced garlic in my cooking.

Most of all, I hate cleaning my garlic press.

So, I quit.

Now I just do 3 pounds of it at once to get it over with.

Step 1: Peel a mountain of garlic while you sit with your sick kiddo who wants you snuggle on the couch with her and watch "Swan Princess" for the 4,257th time.

Step 2: Dump all your peeled garlic into a food processor or any other handy chopping device and pulse several times until it's to your desired minced-ness.

Step 3: Use a tablespoon measure to plop it all out on to something that's easy to pop it off of later when it's frozen. (I use my plastic cutting mats.)

Step 4: Freeze them.

Step 5: Pop 'em all off the tray and into a freezable container or bag!

Ta-da!

This whole process is one of my mama-in-law's clever ideas! 

I love it! I have fresh minced garlic always on hand in my freezer in tidy little tablespoonfuls! 

I have now practically eliminated one of my least favorite kitchen jobs: washing the garlic press! 

Don't ask me why I hate it so much. I just do, 'k?

Instead of the dreaded task being almost a daily occurrence, (okay, so we eat a lot of garlic,) I can simply open my freezer, pull out the bag and grab one or two handy-dandy little tablespoon-sized garlic blops!

Or, I might grab one (or more!) of these... 110 delightful little pieces of heaven sitting in my freezer.

This post is linked to the Raising Homemakers Homemaking Linkup...

...at Our Simple Country Life...

...and at Linda's Lunacy!

Update: See also how I prepare and freeze onions!