The Small Cooking Habit That Makes Weeknight Dinners So Much Easier

When I catch the scent of garlic wafting from the kitchen, I’m immediately intrigued—and hungry. It doesn’t matter if it’s a sizzling veggie stir fry, a savory base for homemade garlic soup or a hot loaf of cheesy garlic bread emerging from the oven. That flavorful and aromatic garlic is the ingredient that always draws me in.

Adding minced garlic to savory dishes, sauces, and bakes is a sure way to elevate flavor. But sometimes I don’t want to spend the time or effort prepping garlic. That’s why store-bought frozen garlic is my favorite time-saving and flavor-boosting hack.

Frozen Garlic Has All the Flavor of Freshly Minced

Having a stash of minced garlic waiting in the freezer makes it easy to add some to whatever you’re cooking, whether the recipe calls for it or not. 

Although grating and mincing fresh cloves of garlic is a relatively quick task, one that can be done with kitchen tools like a good, sharp knife, a garlic press, or a ribbon grater, there are still those times when I need some shortcuts in my dinner prep. Or times when I just don’t want my hands to smell like garlic.

To get that fresh, unadulterated garlic flavor faster, frozen crushed garlic is the next best thing to fresh. It’s available from several brands including Dorot and Crush, stocked in the freezer case, and packaged in teaspoon or clove-sized amounts. Most brands only add vegetable oil and salt to the garlic, and freezing protects its fresh, spicy flavor.

Why I Reach for Frozen Garlic Over Jarred Every Time

Frozen garlic preserves the pungent and fiery flavor of fresh garlic better than jarred.

Packed in water along with citric acid as a preservative, jarred minced garlic has a muted flavor and often a bitter or metallic aftertaste from the acid. This is especially noticeable when jarred garlic is used in recipes defined by fresh garlic flavor, such as stir fries, pesto, and simple pasta dishes like aglio e olio.

And where an opened jar of minced garlic will last only a few weeks in the fridge, frozen garlic lasts for a year or longer, minimizing food waste.  

How To Use Frozen Garlic

It couldn’t be easier to make a habit of adding frozen garlic to your cooking routine. Since recipes typically call for garlic by number of cloves or as measuring spoon quantities, the pre-measured frozen cubes make it easy to pop out exactly the amount you need.

For sautés, soups, slow cooker recipes, and sauces, you can drop the frozen garlic right into the pan, no thawing needed. For recipes like garlic bread where you need to mix the garlic with melted butter and other ingredients, it can be thawed quickly in the microwave.

With the prep done for you, frozen garlic is a great choice to reach for when cooking up prepared foods like frozen meals, jarred sauces, and canned soups. Add the garlic to the pot or give it a little sauté before stirring it into the dish. It only takes a small amount to make prepared foods taste more like from-scratch cooking.

Look for frozen garlic brands in the freezer case of your grocery store, typically stocked alongside frozen vegetables or international foods. Some brands can even be ordered from grocery delivery services like Instacart.