If you don’t LOVE garlic look away now.

Doesn’t almost every great recipe start with a drizzle of good quality extra virgin olive oil, some diced onions and freshly crushed garlic? Well - many of ours do! Here we explore why you should be crushing your garlic.

Allicin in the spotlight: the sulphur compound providing that delicious garlicky flavour also known for it’s medicinal / therapeutic properties.

When raw garlic is crushed/minced (more so than when chopped or sliced) alliin and allinase react to produce allicin. If a milder flavour is desired, slicing or simply cooking whole cloves allows for less cell walls to be broken and less allicin will be produced.

Traditional medicine practices and recent studies report allicin (and other sulphur compounds) may provide health benefits:

• immunoprotective
• antioxidant & anti-inflammatory
• antimicrobial & anti-fungal
• anticarcinogenic
• cardioprotective, reducing blood pressure & improving cholesterol
• aids detoxification

Allicin is however heat sensitive so to enjoy it maximum benefits try to incorporate some raw garlic into your diet too. One of our all time fave salad dressings is a blend of tahini, maple, lemon juice, water and garlic