‘Emeril’ Articles at Sweetnicks

The smell is heavenly, the taste is light, let’s make some Roasted Garlic Mayo!

You likely have heard me extol the virtues of homemade mayonnaise before … it’s so light and lemony and downright delicious that after the first time I made it, I never had store-bought again. Plus it’s so much healthier! Since you’re making it yourself, you KNOW the ingredients that are going in it, and it’s clean eating at its finest, and Whole30 and Paleo to boot. Now we’re “kicking it up a notch,” as Emeril used to say (is he still around and cooking?), with this divine Roasted Garlic Mayo.

First let’s talk about the health benefits of roasted garlic all on its own … to name a few, it’s nutritious, has been shown to reduce blood pressure, it can reduce the length of the common cold, lowers the risk of heart disease, and improves bone health (and so much more!).

Oftentimes, if the oven is going to be on for half an hour, I’ll pop in a bulb of garlic to roast, squeeze out the roasted cloves and keep it in a container in the fridge so I always have some on hand (put in small container and cover with olive oil and they’ll be preserved for about two weeks). You can spread some with butter or ghee on a toasted baguette, add to a veggie stir fry, and pop into the mayo recipe below. I also sometimes it eat just straight up! I used to frequest a restaurant (and even got engaged there!) called The Garlic Rose. Garlic was, as you can imagine, infused in some way into every dish they served and it was as amazing as it sounds. What YOUR favorite way to use roasted garlic?

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We have a handful of Christmas traditions, and our kitchen food-and-drink-themed Christmas tree is surely one of my favorites. We have added enough ornaments to it over the last few years, that last year I set off to find a new and bigger tree. All throughout the season, and even after, I looked and couldn’t find anything that would work. Too big. Too small. Too fat. Or too expensive. Just not right.

So this season, the hunt started again. In earnest. K-Mart. Target. The Christmas Tree Shop. Michael’s. I thought I had actually scored when Michael’s four foot $50 tree went on sale for half-price. Until I carted it home and Nick put it together (thank goodness for him!) and then I realized … it actually wasn’t that much bigger than what we already had. Maybe a foot? And so it went back.

I had all but given up…

Until on a visit to Wal-Mart last week, I spied one that would work. And that they were, of course, sold out of. Luckily they agreed to sell me the floor model (fyi, those stinkers at Target wouldn’t when I found a sold-out one there), so a 6 foot tall skinny tree now sits in our kitchen.

And again, Nick put it together. Obviously with only a few pieces, this is not a hard endeavor. My problem is that I spend so much time trying to track it down, and then lugging it home, my energy and motivation for such things is depleted. And as luck would have it, that’s exactly when his kicks in.

We’re a good team for sure.

So … new additions this year!

Beyond the tree, of course.

There have been some pretty awesome finds.

*my friend Beth found this one for me at Lord & Taylor – love it!