Garlic Bread from a Store Loaf (and I Won't Pretend Otherwise)
Here's the thing about this lesson. I can't make bread. I've tried, more than once, and what comes out is dense enough to prop a door open with. I've made my peace with it. So the garlic bread in this class starts with a loaf you buy, and I'm not going to apologize for that or dress it up like I did something clever by not making my own. I didn't. I bought it, same as you're about to.
What I can do is make store bread taste like somebody cared about it, which is really all garlic bread needs to be. It's not a technique showcase. It's butter, garlic, and a hot oven, done in the right order.
What kind of loaf
Get a real loaf, not the soft sandwich kind. A French or Italian style loaf from the bakery section, something with a little structure to it, holds up better than anything presliced and squishy. It doesn't need to be fancy. I've used the plain bakery loaf from Macey's plenty of times and nobody's complained. If all you've got is a softer loaf, it'll still work, it just won't get quite as crisp on the edges.
Slice it the long way, straight through the middle, so you've got two flat halves with the cut side up. That's your canvas, such as it is.
The butter
This is the whole recipe, honestly. For one loaf:
- 6 tablespoons butter, softened (not melted, softened, there's a difference and melted butter runs off the bread instead of soaking in)
- 3 to 4 cloves garlic, minced fine or pressed through a garlic press
- A small handful of parsley, chopped (fine or not, your call, I've got my reasons for going fine but that's a different lesson)
- A pinch of salt
- Parmesan if you've got it, a couple tablespoons, grated
Mash all that together in a bowl until it's one uniform mess. A fork works fine. You want the garlic distributed evenly, not clumped in one spot where somebody's going to get a bite that knocks them over.
Here's a plain opinion I'll stand behind: you don't need special equipment for any of this. I've made this exact butter with the back of a spoon in a bowl that was older than my kids. The bread doesn't know what your kitchen tools cost.
Spreading and baking
Spread the butter mixture evenly over both cut sides, right to the edges. Don't be shy with it, but don't cake it on so thick it's basically a butter sandwich either. Somewhere in the middle.
Put it on a baking sheet, cut side up, into an oven at 375. Give it about 10 to 12 minutes, until the edges start going golden and the whole kitchen smells like garlic. If you want it crisper, run it under the broiler for the last minute, but stand right there when you do that. Broilers don't warn you. They go from gold to ruined in about twenty seconds and I've lost bread to a broiler more than once because I stepped away to do something I thought would only take a second.
Let it sit a minute before you slice it into pieces. Straight out of the oven it'll fall apart on you.
A word about the garlic itself
Fresh garlic, not the jarred minced stuff, if you can manage it. It matters more here than almost anywhere else in this course, because there's nothing else going on to cover for weak garlic flavor. This is basically a garlic delivery system with bread as the vehicle. Get that part right.
Also, and I say this every time somebody asks, don't use garlic powder here if you can help it. It's not the same flavor, it's a flatter, dustier version of the flavor, and this bread deserves the real thing.
A dry-air aside
I'll admit something that surprised me the first summer I tried growing my own herbs for this. I put basil out on the back step, proud of myself, figuring I'd have fresh herbs all summer without a grocery run. The dry air out here and the heat just cooked half of it before I figured out I needed to water it twice a day instead of once. Half the plant made it. The half that survived went into more sauce than any two people should reasonably eat, but I never did get parsley to grow worth using for this bread. I still buy it. Some things you just buy, and that's fine. The bread's one of them, the parsley turned out to be another.
A note on the garlic press
If you're using a press instead of a knife, keep your fingers clear of the hinge when you squeeze it closed. It's not a dangerous tool exactly, but it pinches, and I've caught myself more than once being careless with it because it seems harmless compared to a knife.
Before next time
Buy your loaf the day you're making this, not three days ahead, bakery bread doesn't keep long before it starts drying out on you. And if anyone at your table wants to dip a piece in fry sauce, let them. I was horrified the first time I saw it too, and I'm still not going to admit in mixed company that it wasn't half bad.