Wet Garlic Pizza Bread and Tiger Tomato Salad

It's a good job I've no aspirations to become a vampire. Garlic seems to divide opinion; you either can't get enough of it or can't stand it. I love it. There are of course many meals where it serves the purpose of adding to the background flavour rather than dominating the meal but a life without garlic, for me, would be a very miserable one indeed.

A few juicy stems of wet garlic arrived in my vegetable box. I knew they would be pretty powerful and pungent and it seemed only right to make garlic bread. However, garlic bread alone does not a meal make and fortunately I had some brilliant tiger tomatoes that I picked up from the farmers' market. I'm not sure how clearly you can see the tomatoes but they are glorious; vibrant red flesh, green seeds and dark green striped skin.

You will need:
For the dough: 500g strong white flour, 1 tsp sugar, 1 tsp salt, 7g sachet yeast, 300ml warm water
3 wet garlic bulbs
Small handful fresh parsley
Tomatoes
6-8 tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 tbsp white wine vinegar
A few fresh basil leaves
Salt and pepper

Start by making the dough. I confess that since the acquisition of my food mixer, making bread dough is simple and carefree. Put all of the ingredients into the bowl, turn the dough hook on and come back 10 minutes later to perfectly kneaded dough. Lazy? Perhaps. Easy? Definitely. Leave the dough in the bowl, cover the top and leave until doubled in size; an hour or so.

Divide the dough into four; I find it freezes very well so I make more than I need. Roll out two pieces on a floured surface and put onto pizza trays. No matter how hard I try my bases will never be circular. Rub a thin layer of olive oil all over the bases. Peel and chop the wet garlic; you can use most of the green part, I've heard some brave (and supposedly halitosis ridden) souls put the leaves in a salad. Put the chopped garlic onto the bases, season with salt and pepper and drizzle with more olive oil. Bake in a preheated oven at 220C for 10-15 minutes.

While the garlic bread cooks make the tomato salad. Cut the tomatoes up however you wish and add a few chopped basil leaves. Make a simple dressing by whisking 3 tbsp olive oil with 1 1/2 tbsp white wine vinegar and some salt and pepper. Sprinkle a little chopped parsley over the garlic bread before serving.

I like making my own garlic bread and this one was brilliant. The white parts of the garlic turned soft and squishy while the green parts turned slightly brown; it was like a tour of the textures and flavours of wet garlic. The tiger tomato salad was lovely, this simple salad is one of my favourite things to do with tomatoes. This would be great to make with normal garlic but if you can get hold of some, try it with wet garlic for something a bit different.