Cooking with Garlic: The Key to Soft and Delicious Results

When it comes to cooking with garlic, many people struggle with achieving that perfect balance between flavor and texture. One common issue is overcooking the garlic, which can result in a burnt, bitter taste that's unpalatable. However, by understanding the science behind cooking garlic, you can unlock its full potential and enjoy deliciously soft and flavorful results.

To achieve this, it's essential to cook garlic for at least a minute before adding other ingredients. This may seem like a long time, but trust us, it makes all the difference. By starting with high heat, some people claim that they can get away with shorter cooking times. However, our goal is to get the garlic nice and soft, so we're focusing on achieving this through more traditional methods.

Let's start by heating up some oil in a pan over medium-high heat. Once it's hot, add your garlic cloves and let them cook for about a minute. You'll begin to notice a light golden color as the garlic starts to soften. Now, it's time to introduce the stems of the greens into the pan. With these stems comes a new challenge: balancing crunch with flavor.

The key here is to cook the stems for just 30 seconds to 1 minute. This allows them to retain their crunch while still infusing the garlic with their delicious flavor. Remember, you want the stems to be vibrant and green, but not overcooked or mushy. Once they're in the pan, it's time to add the rest of the leaves.

This is where technique comes in. The longer you cook the greens, the chewier they'll become. So, if you want your dish to retain a freshness and crunchiness, it's essential to cook them just until they're wilted but still have some bite. To achieve this, turn off the heat as soon as the leaves are wilted, allowing the residual heat to continue cooking them for just a few seconds more.

When it comes to cooking with electric stoves, be mindful of the fact that even when you turn off the stove, it can still retain heat. So, it's crucial to catch those greens while they're still slightly wilted and transfer them to a plate immediately. This will help preserve their texture and flavor, ensuring your dish is both delicious and visually appealing.

In our kitchen, we love experimenting with different amounts of garlic and adjusting the cooking times to suit our taste preferences. Some people prefer a more subtle flavor, while others like to go all out with a pungent aroma. Whatever your style, feel free to add as much or as little garlic as you like. And don't be afraid to try new combinations – after all, that's what makes cooking so exciting!

As we enjoyed our plate of greens and garlic, we couldn't help but think about the power of food to change people's minds. Our husband had grown up eating Chinese broccoli for years, but only because it was a staple in his diet. However, when he tried this recipe, he was surprised by how different it tasted from the usual versions he was used to. This got us thinking – what if we challenge our family members and friends who don't like vegetables or greens? What if we present them with this recipe, following every technique to the letter?

We'd love to hear from you! If you have any questions or tips on cooking garlic, please share them in the comments below. And don't forget to subscribe to Hot Thai Kitchen for new recipes and behind-the-scenes content every week. With a simple click of the bell icon, you'll never miss an episode again.

As always, thank you for watching, and we'll see you next time on Hot Thai Kitchen!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enSawaddee ka welcome to hot Thai kitchen so we have just recently come out of quarantine and  being quarantine has made me very much appreciate the value of quick and easy meals especially if  you've got children at home and also the value of vegetables that last a long time in the fridge so  today I want to share with you a dish that I found myself making during quarantine it's a really it's  a go-to side dish for me basically because it's so easy you barely have to know the recipe like  you just have to know the idea of it and you can just wing it and it's stir-fried Guilin or chinese  broccoli or in Thai we call this kana padnamman hoi Kana is skyla and pad is to stir-fry  and namman hoi is oyster sauce soy sauce is the main ingredient and like oyster sauce and Chinese  broccoli is like a classic pairing in Chinese cuisine but normally you might have seen it  served as like whole stems of guilin steamed with you know like an oyster sauce on top but for me I  like to do a stir-fry with the kyln cut-up so then you can have it like as a side dish with your rice  and everything and you don't have to like Natalie eat a whole stem of guyline which then requires  that you cut it with a knife or not gracefully eat it at the table I think this is like I guess  the more Thai way of doing it is to stir-fry it anyway it's easy it's so delicious and I hope  it will become a part of your regular rotation as well let's get started alright the only technique  here I think is I'm gonna share with you how to prep guyline for optimal stir frying so what I do  is I like to actually separate the leaves and the stems because they don't cook at the same rate so  at the stems first and then followed by the Leafs and I cut my thing in a particular way and you may  have to modify this depending on the if you're using really small young Guilin you may not need  to cut it as the way I do it okay so I'm gonna cut the smaller stems off first and deal with  this big one and with this big one this is quite tough but it's also crunchy and delicious actually  love the stem a lot more than the leaves I cut it at a sharp bias and then you get these nice  pieces that are really crunchy and delicious and I cut it you know when you end up getting  pieces like this it's fine it's a stir-fry once you get to the leaves I just roughly chop it so  that you've got a reasonable sized piece that can be put into your mouth gracefully we've all had a  giant piece of lettuce in a bowl of salad then you wish somebody had cut into three yeah so you want  to be aware of that especially the leaves are really wide you might need to like tear it up  like this and then I keep the leaves on the stems in separate piles so this is the only part that  might take a little bit of attention the rest is super super easy with a smaller stem like  this I don't have to slice it as thinly because it will cook quickly so I just do this and then  that's fine and then you get to the leaves you cut it like that I will tear into piecesyeah and if you've got a piece that's really white what you might want to do is just cut  it lengthwise first and then you know cut it into pieces and this will wilt quite a bit  so it doesn't have to be tiny but you know you don't want it long there's my stems okay let's  do the sauce which is super simple you can just like throw this in the wok at the stove but I  just want to just you know do it the hot tight kitchen style I've got some oyster sauce for  this you definitely want to use good-quality Oster sauce so when you look for a source at  the store look for something where the oyster is the first ingredient and then I'm gonna add  just a little bit of soy sauce you can't just use always err sauce but I think a combination of the  two gives a nicer result I'm gonna add a splash of water you can use chicken stock if you've got  one already open but it's a small amount you don't need to open a whole new one for it I'm  going to add a little bit of sugar and I've got a touch of white pepper right here that I will add  at the walk and then the only other ingredient I need is garlic lots and lots of garlic and  you can roughly chop but what I like to do is actually pound them so I've got garlic I have  not yet peeled because I'm gonna pound them I just have to basically give them a crush so if you've  lightly crushed them and then oops the peel just slips right off and then you just take the peel  out of your mortar basically see so easy and if you get little like bits of garlic peel in the  mortar don't worry about that in Thailand for the little little tiny cloves of garlic they're  called Thai garlic we don't even peel them we just crush them and then just throw everything  in and it's fine just give that a rough pound just so they're like shredded shredded but still  big pieces which I like is we're gonna cook this to the point where the pieces are nice and soft  and sweet so just like that if you want to add spicy you can add some fresh Thai chili so you  just pound the Thai chilies first into a paste and then add the garlic and pound the garlicso just a little bit of oil in here I'm gonna starch on relatively low heat so like medium low  so that I give a lot of time for my garlic to heat up and infuse the oil without it burning so this  is a thing I think a lot of people misunderstand about stir frying is everything's got to be hot  all the time and it's not gentle sizzle is what you're going for and then keep the heat relatively  low you want to be able to cook with garlic for at least like a whole minute before it starts  to turn brown I mean you could do it high heat as well but my goal here is to get the garlic  nice and soft so I need that time nice don't get garlic little more oil okay now I'm starting to  see a light golden color I'm gonna go in with the stems and once you add the vegetables and you can  turn the heat up a little bit and the stems are gonna need about a minute doesn't it you know  you want them the stems to still be crunchy at the end exploding garlic I think I have garlic  on my lashes cooking is some dangerous speeds people you understand will still be crunchy so  you don't want to overcook it so it needs 30 seconds to a minute okay stems are now vibrant  and green I'm gonna go in with the rest of the leaves now this is the key here the longer you  cook dial on the chewier the Leafs become so you just want but you literally just want it's wilted  and out it comes but gotta get all your sauce in there so as soon as it's wilted you turn off the  heat right away you keep cooking it you keep cooking it the leaves will become chewier you  want the leaves to still kind of have a freshness about them if you're cooking with electric stove  be mindful of the fact that if you turn off the stove it's still going like it's still hot so you  want to turn it off a little sooner okay that's it like that's literally it it will continue to wilt  with the residual heat and you want to get it out of the pan into a plate right away because again  residual heat whoa look at that they're cooked they're wilted but there's still freshness and  a little bit of volume on them behave nice garlic pieces you can even with more garlic put as much  garlic as you like put a whole head all right let's get some rice oh yes get some extra sauce  on it I mean this is so good sometimes if I just like need a light lunch I'll just eat a leftover  of this with rice and I don't need any protein oyster is a protein get a mix of stems and leavesyou can hear how crunchy that isand I'm gonna just eat a little piece of garlic that I so carefully made sure they're still in  big pieces oh good so I'm good Adam give me 15 minutes you guys it's a plate of greens and I  am so excited okay that is saying something okay like my husband grew up eating Chinese  broccoli like his entire life basically and um so he's not a fan of it because I feel  like he's reached his sort of guideline quota for his entire life but when he tried this he  was like oh this is good like this is different from the way you know he would normally have it  which is just seems basically so if you've got kids or members of the family who are just like  I don't like vegetables I don't like green let me please challenge them tell me tell them that  I sent you with this recipe follow it exactly follow all the technique and tell me they still  don't like it because I am willing to bet that this could change their mind so I hope you give  this a try the recipe as always will be on hot Thai Kitchen calm and when you make it send me  a photo you can tag me on Instagram that's the best place to send me photos or post it to my  facebook page or tag me on Twitter and if you haven't subscribed to the show make sure you do  so you don't miss an episode and click the bell icon as well so you get a notification when it  goes a new video thank you as always for watching and I will see you next time for your next mission\n"