Garlic: Not Just For Scaring Off Vampires!

Today’s menu: Garlic pork roast, roasted garlic mashed potatoes, peas and homemade bread.

It’s a theme dinner today with a focus on garlic.  What a wonderful little vegetable AND herb it is!   Tasty no matter how you cook it-roasted, sautéed, fried, and raw, it’s definitely a nice way to add a kick of flavour to any dish.  Along with it being tasty, it also boasts many health benefits as well.  It’s known to help prevent heart disease, lower cholesterol, and regulate blood sugar levels.

This roast recipe, like my chili recipe, has very little in the way of measuring out ingredients.  Once again, I am employing the pinch/dash method of measuring.  When in doubt, always go a little light on the seasonings if you’re not too sure-you can always add some more pepper and salt later if need be.  This is a pretty straightforward recipe, and it’s not too much work.  Here’s how it’s done:

•    3lb pork roast-bone in or out, your preference
•    1 bulb plus 4 cloves of garlic (the bulb is roasted for the mashed potatoes)
•    Seasoning salt
•    Pepper
•    ¾ cup water
•    2lbs potatoes
•    ¼ to ½ cup milk, warmed
•    Butter, to taste (for potatoes)
•    Salt and pepper, to taste (for potatoes)
•    2 cups peas or vegetable of your choice for the side dish

With a pointed knife, pierce your pork roast and make small pockets for your garlic.  Place thick slices of peeled garlic into the pockets of the pork roast all over.  Season the roast with some seasoning salt, and a few grinds of fresh pepper.  Place into roasting pan with ½ cup of water, and cook in a 325 degree oven until meat thermometer inserted in center of roast reaches 160F.  Transfer to a cutting board and tent with foil to rest, approximately 10 minutes.

For your roasted garlic potatoes: cut the top off of a bulb of garlic and drizzle with oil.  Wrap garlic in tinfoil and roast in a 375F oven for 35 minutes or until tender.  Remove from the oven and let cool.  Boil potatoes until tender; drain.  Squeeze cloves of garlic into potatoes, add butter, milk, salt and pepper and mash until smooth.  Add more salt and pepper, if necessary.

Happy Eating!