Oven roasted butternut squash chunks

A bruised garlic clove is a whole garlic clove that has been lightly smushed by the flat part of your knife.  It may crack a little but more or less stays whole. 

The reason your recipe asks for it this way is that you avoid burning.  Garlic takes on different flavors and textures according to how it is cut up.  For example, roasting a head of garlic whole and wrapped up in foil creates a wonderful nutty caramelized paste.  The general rule is that the finer the garlic is chopped the stronger the flavor is.  chopping it up as you describe for your butternut squash will result in burning the garlic bits and making them bitter.  By keeping it whole you will be roasting them and they will come out softer and nicer and you can chop them up then. 

Arugula and white beans sounds nice, why not?  Happy cooking!

KK,

I agree , don't want to overpower the dish.

I agree totally on keeping the cloves of garlic as whole as possible.  With a recipe like this, to my taste, and for helping it caramelise a bit, I'd add in a couple tsp brown sugar, that's just my tast....Hope it went well.

Quote:

Originally Posted by markg2 

One last question on this thing--

 

If thyme, sage and rosemary can work with vegetables, does the flavor generally get clobbered if all 3 are used versus 2 of the 3?

 

Mark

No, it's just a matter of personal preference.  All those herbs are robust and can stand to be with eachother because they are earthy and strong.  If you tried to pair sage and mint though that's another story.  Heck why don't you throw some bay leaves in there too?

I wasn't being completely serious, just saying that you could put bay leaf flavor in and it could work.

Ordinarily yes, dried bay leaves need moisture to cook; usually in a soup, braise or stew.  If you use them fresh they have a bit more versatility.  I've stuck dried bay leaves under the skin of roast birds before, under a roast beat or amongst a tray of roast veggies and felt that it gave flavor.  If you're interested in using it in your butternut squash simply tuck it in under the squash cubes.  Don't be afraid of it, truthfully you'll have more problems keeping the garlic from burning than worrying about bay leaves.