Garlic Bread

Last week I made Pasta Bolognese, and what I didn't show is that I served it with Garlic Bread. Whether or not Garlic Bread is actually served with dishes like this in Italy, it has become a great pairing. It's like shopping and becoming broke, flying on airplanes and getting little packets of peanuts, being in Seattle and wearing North Face Jackets, sitting outside on Red Square at UW and doing some good ol' fashioned people watching. Well, maybe not everything is a great pairing, but they do seem to go together.

Now, I used to get those all ready and prepared garlic breads in the foil packages that are smothered with butter which you stick into the oven and forget about it but that can't be too healthy for right? But times have changed, it's time to expose yourself to some simple garlic bread that lets the bread and garlic do all the talking. Plus, it's not even funny how much more garlic bread you get by doing it this way, and can we all say, life is just better with more bread?

I've seen this method of garlic bread many times on TV so I don't really call it a recipe. It's more like a method. Toast some bread, rub some garlic, spread some butter. Done, done and done. I don't know how much more simple it can get. You end up with something thats buttery, crisp, chewy and garlic-y that still has a bit of a bite to it and it's oh so good!

Garlic Bread

"Recipe" by Me

Ingredients

1 loaf of Artisan bread, (Pugliese, Sour Dough, French, etc)
2 cloves of garlic
Butter

Directions
Cut the "root end" off of the garlic cloves and simply peel off the paper skin. It's important not to smash the garlic to remove the paper skin easier. A whole, intact, clove is much easier to use in this recipe. Set aside.

Take the artisan bread of choice and using a serrated knife, cut the bread in 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick slices. At this point there are many options to take in toasting the bread. You can use a grill pan and grill the bread until golden brown, you can use a preheated oven at 350 degrees F and bake until golden brown. However, what I like to do is actually use a regular toaster since I usually only need a couple of slices of bread. Whichever you prefer, the goal is a golden brown piece of bread that's crisp on the outside, yet soft and chewy on the inside.

Take the toasted bread and while it's still hot, begin to rub the cut side of the garlic clove onto the bread. You know you've rubbed enough garlic when you do not hear the sound of the scraping garlic on the toasty bread. Immediately, spread butter on the bread and enjoy!

-Aaron John