One of my favorite foods from the garden is garlic. Not only is it easy to grow and harvest, but the flavor has me dreaming about those little green shoots that pop up in February. Oh garlic… how do I love thee? Minced into salsa. Roasted and slathered across a baguette. Sautéed with scrambled eggs. Tossed into pasta. And you are the secret ingredient in my bechamel sauce. But now I have a new way to love you. Soup! Simple. Straightforward. Garlic soup.
A bumper garlic harvest had me scratching my head on how to use this bigger than usual crop. Wow. We would be eating garlic for months and still have plenty. But as I cleaned and sorted bulbs, a faint memory came into focus. There I was in Prague, at a quaint little restaurant, on a late summer day. In front of my was a hearty hunk of homemade bread and a steaming bowl of garlic soup. The aroma was heady and flavor was fantastic. Best of all. It was garlicky!
With a clear vision of what I wanted to create, I set about the task of making garlic soup from scratch.
100 Clove Garlic Soup
- 100 cloves of garlic, peeled
- 1/4 C. olive oil
- 2 Tbs. butter
- 2 Tbs. olive oil
- 1 Tbs. dried thyme or chives
- 5 C. yellow onions, diced
- 5 C. vegetable stock
- 1/2 C. cream (or half and half)
- salt and pepper to taste
- lemon wedges (optional)
Place 80 garlic cloves in an oven-proof pan. Coat cloves with 1/4 C. olive oil. Stir the cloves so each is coated with olive oil. Cover pan with lid or foil. Roast in a pre-heated oven at 375F. Bake for 30 – 36 minutes until the garlic is fork-tender and is golden. (Do not let them brown)! Remove from oven and allow to cool enough to handle the cloves.
Place a stock pot over medium heat. Add the butter and 2 Tbs. of olive oil. After the butter has melted, add onions and stir to combine. Allow to cook for 5 minutes, then add the remaining 20 cloves of raw garlic. Stirring occasionally to ensure even cooking of the garlic with onions. Add the dried herbs and vegetable stock. Add the roasted garlic cloves. Cover the stock pot and reduce the heat slightly and allow the mixture to cook for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, remove the pot from heat and take off the lid. Use and immersion blender to puree the soup. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Put stock pot back on the stove, add cream and bring to a simmer. Once the soup reaches a simmer, remove from heat.
Ladle into bowls and serve a wedge of lemon with each bowl. Squeeze the lemon juice over the soup. This soup is also fine without the lemon… but the lemon adds something extra to the flavor.
Croutons are wonderful with soup or slices of a good, crusty bread.
This soup is truly for the garlic lovers. The roasted flavor comes through nicely and pureed soup has a wonderful texture.
So next time you are wondering what to make when you have a lot of garlic on hand, think soup! It is luscious on the tongue and the flavor will have you going back for seconds! Enjoy.
You had me salivating at the pic! Definitely a try at home recipe! Tnx for sharing.
I hope you enjoy it! The aroma is heady and it is luscious. The ultimate compliment was when my husband licked his bowl clean.
I wonder if I’ve eaten at that same place in Prague! I am a garlic queen, too. I eat so much of it, it’s ridiculous. This soup sounds fantastic, I’m definitely trying it soon!
The memory of that garlic soup in Prague had me thinking about how I could re-create that flavor. (I no longer remember the name of the restaurant). But I am so happy with this soup and it satisfies my garlic cravings. I hope you enjoy it!
Ladle into “bowels”?? BEST TYPO EVER!!!!
Oh… thanks for the catch. Darn auto-correct.
This soup looks wonderful! At what point are the roasted garlic cloves added to the soup?
After the dried herbs are added. They are placed in the pot before the 30 minute cooking time so the soup becomes infused with the roasted garlic flavor.
Looking forward to harvesting my first ‘real’ garlic crop soon (down in Aussie-land) … kinda hoping I’ll get enough to put 100 cloves in a pot of soup. Sounds so lavish and yum yum yummy!
I hope that you have a bumper crop of garlic! This is a great way to use some of your harvest. Enjoy the soup!
YUM…I have to try this:-) I have a lot of extra garlic. I did not get as much pesto made as I had hoped for so my garlic was surplus and I can’t plant it all-lol. thank you for sharing!!!
This soup is certainly for the garlic lover. I hope you enjoy it.
What a healthy recipe that sounds tasty too. Thanks for sharing on Real Food Fridays blog hop. Pinned & twitted.
This really is a tasty recipe and will make the garlic-lover in your life happy. (Mine licked the bowl). I hope you enjoy! Thank you for the the pin and tweet.
Garlic dip Ive heard of, but never soup! Looks like a great way to use some of my big garlic crop from last year – http://bit.ly/1mZfJsb
We grow our own garlic as well. Garlic soup is a great way to enjoy part of the harvest.
As size of garlic cloves varies highly, could you give a ball park measurement in cups and/or the weight?
Approximately 3 1/2 to 4 Cups of cloves. Hope this helps.
I’ve never heard of garlic soup, so I was a little unsure when I first started reading. That is until I read the recipe, now I want more garlic cloves to make the soup. Decadence in a Bowl really is a good name for this recipe. Can’t wait to try it.
Thanks for sharing at Tasty Tuesday
I had never heard of garlic soup until I took a trip to Prague. After trying it, I thought that I definitely need to try making it at home. I hope you enjoy it!