Treasure!
That’s what I thought when the garlic scapes arrived. Up until now, we’d only read about these – we’d never actually had any to play with. Scapes are the “flower” stalks of garlic plants and interestingly, only certain varieties produce them. I say “flower”, but in fact the head of the scape is a cluster of miniature cloves.
Our grower friends Ian and Diana recently cut the scapes off their garlic bulbs – a necessary process to ensure the plant doesn’t divert all its energy into flowering rather than forming cloves. Di, bless her, arrived with a huge bag full for me…
A week later, Uncle Steve (Pete’s brother) dropped off another bag of scapes, although these were obviously from a different variety of garlic. Whereas Diana’s were curled, these were straight…
As you can see, the heads are jam-packed with bulbils…
The entire scape is edible, although the tops were very garlicky indeed! The stalks have a milder, but still very distinct, and very fresh, garlic flavour and aroma.
I didn’t want to waste this fabulous bounty, so I washed, chopped and froze about a third of the scapes…
Others were added to stirfries and stews for a gentle garlic kick. The remainder were pulsed in the food processor with flaked almonds, salt and olive oil to create a delicious scape pistou – so called because unlike pesto, it doesn’t have any cheese added…
I’ve been stirring this garlicky paste into everything from pasta (and then I do add cheese) to fried rice. It also makes a delicious dip spread over thin slices of sourdough.
I was right, wasn’t I? It really was treasure.
PS. Have a look at what Linda’s doing with her homegrown scapes!
