black garlic making

so in january, i decided that i am buying a toy. i was initially looking at a dehydrator, used, under 40. 
this proved to be quite difficult- it seems that all the decent dehydrators for decent prices were all sold out and just wasnt available anywhere in the used item market-

i blame the legalization for 420.
pot became regal in canada on 17 october 2018, and with a little bit of time, i think many people are now on the dank tomato bandwagon, growing stuff in tin-foiled closets- 

i support this hypothesis with abundance of advertisement about 'serious' growing lights and portable hot house kits that all the sudden started to appear in the city. then i started to hear people talk about home crop. then i realized that many would now have good production going on, a good year and some later, and probably wants to dry some for 'sharing.'

long story short, in search of kitchen toys, i ran into a good priced sous-vide: the meat jacuzzi. it keeps a water bath at a constant temperature, and you sink raw food in sealed bag, and let it cook through gentle heat in non-hurry.

and me being me, i dont eat a lot of meat to begin with. so i started to look for ways to use it for weirder things.

and then i stumbled into local auction sites, and realized that i could also get a great dehydrator: a 9-tiered excaliber. i had a budget in mind in everything, but the heat of the auction was too enticing, and i ended up overspending by 20 and then ended up owning this big black dry box as well.

so what to make: 
then i ran into black garlic.
basically, garlic cooked over gentle heat over a long period of time.  
everyone said it's quite passive to make: just stick garlic in, make sure that it's off the metal surface to prevent burning, and plug it on for 3 weeks on 'keep warm.'

after reading some obscure sites, i decided on trying it out with sous-vide and dehydrator.

so:
06 Feb 2020:
bought garlic. stupidly unpeeled. so had to peel them. gah.
then two bags of raw garlic went into sous vide @ 168'F for 48 hours.
why 48 hrs? why not. things usually release some moisture, so i thought i would see how much moisture would be released, ad what it does to the texture.

07 Feb 2020: 
woke up to strong smell of garlic. somehow, they spoke through their bags UNDER water. amazing.
turned on all the fans and opened the window. 
24 hrs later: the garlic are noticeably brown, and it is quite wet. both bags. so that's not about leaky bags. i stuck both bags back in the bath.

08 Feb 2020:
still quite pungent in the house. went out and picked up three air sponges. they were kept open in the kitchen from this point on. cant really tell if it helped.
at end of 48 hours, i took it out, drained the 'juices' into a bottle (it turned into a garlic jelly when cooled. planning to use it as wet seasoning for other things), and put these brown garlics into dehydrator at 'veg' setting for 24 hours. housemate is being a saint. he's letting it happen despite the permeation of all that is garlic into the entire apartment. texture is totally soft, so trying not to crush/smear them...

09 Feb 2020:
decided that it looked dry enough, so back to the sous vide. for whatever hours.  the garlics are now dark-ish milk-chocolate brown. tasted one, and it's jut about 25% sharp. so it needs more time. fine. even after drying, it's quite soft. 

10 Feb 2020:
even after all that, still quite smelly. amazing. but they are getting darker. quite soft as well.

11 Feb 2020: 
impatient me decided that it looks black enough. so back to the dehydrator. 

12 Feb 2020:
decided to pack a few for a friend who was swinging into the city for a short errands trip. chewed on one, it's still a bit kicking. it's mellowed out a lot. for cooking or dropping them into stew would be great. or even into rice/other hot starches.  rest, back into sous vide, the temp is kept constant at 168'f.

13 Feb 2020:
actually left it alone.
halleluija.

14 Feb 2020:
momdad were going to drop by. so decided to take them out of the sous-vide. they really are black now, and quite hard. one of the bags somehow lost its seal slightly, so that's just a bit 'boiled brown garlic.' darn it. but the intact bag had sticky, dry-ish (bit like really unruly dates?), sweet black garlic.
and decided that it's enough faff. couldve kept them in for a bit longer i think.

****
so there it was. black garlic.
personal notes: may be i would drop the temp a bit, may be... 155? the number 167'f came from another experimenter's note. but at 155'f, it would need to stay a bit longer i think. the two stages of dehydrating is essential to keep some shape for these garlics. the house smells despite of the double barriers- bags, and the water. that is amazing.

so there it was, a proper faff. i suppose a week is much faster than 3 weeks, and this shall go down as the first serious kitchen experiment in a good while. 
go make some!