Roasted Garlic and Comté Bread
I’ve found that one of Comté’s true romances is roasted garlic. Mashed together and bound with a stick of soft butter and flecked with some chopped thyme you create a compound butter that’s heavenly when packed into a loaf of bread and baked. It’s a modern take on garlic-Parmesan bread from Vanilla Garlic that tastes of antiquity and adventures abroad.
Ingredients
- 2 heads of garlic
- Olive oil
- 1 loaf of quality rustic-style bread
- 1 tablespoon fresh thyme minced
- 1 stick 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 pinch kosher salt
- 3 ounces Comté shredded
Instructions
- Heat oven to 400°F. Cut the tops of the heads of garlic, just enough to expose the cloves. Rub the garlic with olive oil and place in the slots of a muffin tin and cover with foil. Roast for about 35 minutes or until the cloves are soft and squishy. Allow the garlic to cool completely before squeezing the cloves out into a bowl.
- Slice long groves into the bread, but don't cut all the way through. You want deep crevices for the butter mixture.
- Mix roasted garlic together with the butter, Comté, salt, and thyme with a wooden spoon. Cram the butter into the crevices of the bread.
- Wrap the loaf up in foil and bake for 20 minutes. Then unwrap it a bit to expose the top and bake for 5 more minutes so it can get all crusty with cheese and butter. Allow the bread to cool for a minute or two because the cheese is molten hot. Then go at it like a beast.
