My sister always goes above and beyond with the cooking. She’s a gourmet cook and awesome! I know I will always eat well when I visit.
Here is a very tasty, addictive little appetizer my sister made for my brother-in-law’s birthday party (of which I was a guest during my April 2012 vacation to Washington State).
I must tell you I don’t have photos for every single step of this appetizer construction – I either forgot (like with photos of the tops cut off the garlic heads), or my fingers were too messy to pick up the camera, or I was too busy eating the appetizer to think of taking a photo of it, messy fingers or no.
Sorrrrryyyy.
So, for this recipe, you need:
- A small cupcake baking pan (one of those pans that allow for 6 cupcakes)
- Several heads of garlic
Now, you need to roast said heads of garlic. My sister wanted to try a new method for doing this, rather than using the ceramic garlic roaster they have. I can tell you I have tried the crockpot method of roasting garlic, and I am personally underwhelmed, so I was interested to see how her method turned out. After tasting the results, she and I agreed: to get a true roast garlic flavor with some wonderful caramelization, you must roast it in the oven.
- Slice off the tops of each garlic head so that you can see the insides of the garlic cloves.
- Rub olive oil over each garlic head and also inside the cupcake pans.
- Wrap aluminum foil over the pan and set inside the oven set at 375 degrees. Bake for 1 to 1-1/2 hours. You will want to periodically check to make sure the garlic is not only spreadably soft, but also nicely caramelized.
- Some of the cloves may stick to the aluminum foil – my sister tried spraying the foil with a non-stick spray, but that didn’t seem to work. So, we just ate those few roasted cloves that stuck to the foil 😉
Roasted garlic. Done.
Now, for the pita chips.
- Purchase a bag of pita bread
- Either tear the pita bread into smaller pieces, or cut it into smaller pieces for a more orderly look to the edges of the chips.
- Slather melted butter (the real stuff) over each piece and then stick in the oven to bake at 375 degrees F for oh – maybe 10 minutes or so? It’s not an exact science so you will want to keep checking the chips to make sure they don’t burn. They should be nice and crispy.
Baked pita chips. Done.
- Purchase some cambozola cheese. I live in rural SE Texas (bleah) and when I made this appetizer for myself, I could not find that particular cheese even in the Super HEB some 22 miles away from my town. So, I purchased brie cheese and gorgonzola cheese and sliced a little of each.
Now, serve your guests (or yourself) the pita chips and slather (I mean, spread) a little of the cheese, then the roasted garlic atop your chip.
Enjoy! 
Where The Trails Take You Photography 