Garlic is an anti-inflammatory and flavour superhero. I can’t get enough of the stuff – and to think I told my mother-in-law in the early days after meeting her (a scary 24 years ago!) that I didn’t like garlic. Oh how we laugh about that now!

I store mine in a cool, dry and dark place in a clay pot which allows it to breathe. Once the cloves have been separated, they’ll need using quickly (within a week or two). It doesn’t fare well in the fridge, unless roasted first, but it can be frozen, so you could prepare a load of garlic and freeze in portions to save you some time and energy when preparing a meal.

I like to finely chop or crush with a knife, though when feeling lazy, I grate it. When cooking with A, I ask her to crush the garlic using the back of a fork.

This photo, by the way, taken by my husband, @througheye, is one of my favourite shots from his portfolio. It is some garlic that I grew in our tiny garden at our old house that was drying in the sun and won him the the Food Photographer of the Year Cream of the Crop award a number of years ago. It has pride of place on our dining room wall.