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Garlic scapes are delicious, versatile and a bonus harvest when you grow your own garlic. These curly scapes have a few uses but today we are going to cover how to make garlic scape powder.
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This post is all about how to make garlic scape powder.
Table of Contents
What are garlic scapes?
Garlic scapes are the inner part of the garlic leaves that can show you when your garlic is close to harvest. They start small and straight and then continue to grow, curling around as they do. Eventually they straighten out and flower but when this happens, the scapes become tough and woody.
When should I harvest them?
As mentioned above, you wont want to wait too long to harvest. I like to pull them when they have one curl. If you forget and they have 2 curls, no worries! Pull them then instead.
By pulling the scape, you allow the garlic to focus its energy on creating a big beautiful bulb.
How do I harvest the scapes?
All you have to do to harvest the scapes is gently pull on them. They slide out from the plant (it is like a tube) and you will hear a snapping sound.
If you don’t want to pull them out, you can snap them at the base or you can gently snip them with sharp scissors.
What can I do with garlic scapes?
There are so many things you can do with garlic scapes! You can treat them like you would chives:
- Chop them up fresh into salad
- On top of pizza
- In pasta
- In pasta or egg salad
You can also saute them up fresh with some butter and salt and they are a delicious side to your meal. They have a hint of garlic flavour but no where near as potent as fresh garlic.
Finally, you can treat them similar to garlic and use them anywhere you want a garlicky flavour. I find the best way to do this is by making garlic scape powder which is what we will talk about today.
What materials do you need to make powder?
There are only a handful of items you should consider getting to make your own scapes.
- A food processor: I LOVE this one that I have. It is also an immersion blender and a power whisk. I use it every single day.
- A food dehydrator: I have the 9 tray excalibur dehydrator and I use it almost every single day during harvest time. I make my own spices, dehydrate herbs and make my own milk powder with this bad boy. I would HIGHLY recommend investing in one if you are planning on preserving anything from your garden.
- A mason jar vacuum sealer: This will double the storage time on your herbs and that is huge if you are trying to build a large pantry of food. I love this one from forjars as it does not use electricity so you could use it in a power outage or survival situation.
I would love to invest in a freeze dryer someday but they are so expensive. While freeze drying is so cool, a dehydrator is much more practical for the average household. Again, if you don’t have one, I would recommend you checking out the excalibur!
How to make garlic scape powder with a dehydrator
It could not be more simple to make your own garlic scape powder! All you have to do is harvest the scapes, give them a quick rinse and then pop them in the dehydrator.
As you can see in the pictures, this time around I experimented with doing whole chunks of the scapes. It took a lot longer to dehydrate but it removed almost all of the hands on time. With that being said, I would recommend following these steps instead.
- Harvest the garlic scapes (as shown above.)
- Give them a quick rinse to make sure there is no dirt or bugs.
- Pat dry to ensure there is no extra water which will add time to your dehydrating time.
- Chop them up into 1 inch pieces (or give them a light blitz in a food processor.) You want the pieces to be small, but not blended.
- Place them in the dehydrator at 125F for 6-8 hours, checking on them every so often. When they are done, they should snap when you bend them.
- Blitz them up into as fine a powder as you want in a food processor, blender or spice grinder.
- If you want ultra fine powder, you can run the scapes through a fine mesh strainer first.
- Store airtight in a mason jar or other airtight container until you are ready to use. Enjoy!
How to make garlic scape powder in the oven
All of the steps are the same as when you are using a dehydrator.
- Instead of using your dehydrator racks, use a baking tray lined with parchment.
- Then set your oven to the lowest temperature and crack the door a little bit while they dry.
- Check on them often and give them a stir a few times during the process.
*Never leave an oven unattended and try to do this on a day where there are no kids or pets around you!
Do I have to dehydrate them?
Nope! You can use some string, the them into a bundle and hang dry them.
You will want the place you hang them to be in a warm, dry area away from direct sunlight. The downside to this method is there is a potential to mold so be sure you check them often and throw out any moldy ones.
Thank you!
Thank you so much for reading! I hope your garlic scape power adventures bring you lots of success!
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