Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Homemade Garlic Bread

I use the term "home made" loosely, as I did not actually make the bread, but I did make the spread that goes on it. I bought a partially cooked loaf of ciabatta, and finished off in the oven.

Cheesy Factor (1 no cheese, 10 all cheese): you could add cheese, it would obviously make it even better
Dummy Factor (1 easiest, 10 hardest): 1
Time Factor (1 shortest, 10 longest): 1

Garlic Bread
7-8 large garlic cloves, loosely chopped
1/2 cup fresh herbs, chopped (combination of parsley, oregano, and basil recommended)
3/4 tsp kosher salt
Fresh ground black pepper
1/2 cup good quality olive oil
1 loaf ciabatta bread
3 Tbl unsalted butter

Preheat oven to 350 deg (if using already cooked bread, 385 deg if partially cooked). Place garlic in food processor and process until minced. Add herbs and salt and pulse 3-4 times. Put olive oil in sauce pan over medium-low heat and then add garlic mixture. Cook, while stirring for 2-3 minutes or so, then remove pan from heat. Slice ciabatta bread in half horizontally. Spread butter on one half of the bread, spoon all olive oil mixture on the other half and spread around in even layer. Close the two pieces of bread back together, wrap in tinfoil. Cook for 5 minutes in tinfoil, then remove from tinfoil and cook additional 5 minutes, if using pre-cooked bread (otherwise, cook additional 8-10 minutes if using partially cooked bread, until crispy on outside).

This is really really good. And don't be afraid of using all the olive oil mixture. It looks like a lot, but it is dang good.