A garlic press, also known as a garlic crusher, is a

kitchen utensil A kitchen utensil is a small hand-held tool used for food preparation. Common kitchen tasks include cutting food items to size, heating food on an open fire or on a stove, baking, grinding, mixing, blending, and measuring; different utensils ar ...

to crush

garlic Garlic (''Allium sativum'') is a species of bulbous flowering plants in the genus '' Allium''. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, chives, Welsh onion, and Chinese onion. Garlic is native to central and south Asia, str ...

cloves efficiently by forcing them through a grid of small holes, usually with some type of

piston A piston is a component of reciprocating engines, reciprocating pumps, gas compressors, hydraulic cylinders and pneumatic cylinders, among other similar mechanisms. It is the moving component that is contained by a cylinder (engine), cylinder a ...

. Many garlic presses also have a device with a matching grid of blunt pins to clean out the holes. The first patent for a garlic press is credited to Karl Zysset (1907–1988) founder of the Swiss kitchen utensil company Zyliss, though the design is functionally identical to earlier presses that were in widespread use. Garlic presses present a convenient alternative to mincing garlic with a knife, especially because a clove of garlic can be passed through a sturdy press without even removing its peel. The peel remains in the press while the garlic is extruded out. Some sources also claim that pressing with the peel on makes cleaning the press easier. Garlic crushed by a press is generally believed to have a different flavor from minced garlic, more of garlic's strong flavor compounds are liberated. A few sources prefer the flavor of pressed garlic. Raw-foods chef Renée Underkoffler says "a good garlic press makes dealing with garlic a clean pleasure. Pressed garlic has a lighter, more delicate flavor than minced garlic because it excludes the bitter center stem." The magazine ''

Cook's Illustrated ''Cook's Illustrated'' is an American cooking magazine published every two months by America's Test Kitchen Limited Partnership (ATK) in Brookline, Massachusetts. On February 2, 2023, ''Cook's Illustrated'' was one of ATK's brands included in th ...

'' says "a good garlic press can break down cloves more finely and evenly than an average cook using a knife, which means better distribution of garlic flavor throughout any given dish."Wu, Sandra. "Notes from Readers", ''Cook's Illustrated'', Sept. & Oct. 2006 p. 3. On the other hand, some chefs say garlic crushed in a press has an inferior flavor compared to other forms of garlic. For instance, chef

Anthony Bourdain Anthony Michael Bourdain ( ; June 25, 1956 – June 8, 2018) was an American celebrity chef, author and Travel documentary, travel documentarian. He starred in programs focusing on the exploration of international culture, cuisine, and the huma ...

called garlic presses "abominations" and advised "''don't'' put it through a press. I don't know what that junk is that squeezes out of the end of those things, but it ain't garlic." The cookery writer

Elizabeth David Elizabeth David ( Gwynne, 26 December 1913 – 22 May 1992) was a British cookery writer. In the mid-20th century she strongly influenced the revitalisation of home cookery in her native country and beyond with articles and books about Europea ...

wrote an essay titled "Garlic Presses are Utterly Useless".

Alton Brown Alton Crawford Brown Jr. (born July 30, 1962) is an American television personality, food show presenter, food scientist, author, voice actor, and cinematographer. He is the creator and host of the Food Network television show '' Good Eats'' th ...

(known for his dislike of single-purpose kitchen tools) has referred to garlic presses as "useless" and without a reason to exist. ''Cook's Illustrated'' lists some additional uses for a garlic press, such as mashing other small items (including

olive The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'' ("European olive"), is a species of Subtropics, subtropical evergreen tree in the Family (biology), family Oleaceae. Originating in Anatolia, Asia Minor, it is abundant throughout the Mediterranean ...

caper ''Capparis spinosa'', the caper bush, also called Flinders rose, is a perennial plant that bears rounded, fleshy leaves and large white to pinkish-white flowers. The taxonomic status of the species is controversial and unsettled. Species with ...

anchovies An anchovy is a small, common forage fish of the family Engraulidae. Most species are found in marine waters, but several will enter brackish water, and some in South America are restricted to fresh water. More than 140 species are placed in 1 ...

ginger Ginger (''Zingiber officinale'') is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or ginger, is widely used as a spice and a folk medicine. It is an herbaceous perennial that grows annual pseudostems (false stems made of the rolled bases of l ...

and canned

chipotle A chipotle ( , ), or chilpotle, is a smoke-dried ripe jalapeño chili pepper used for seasoning. It is a chili used primarily in Mexican and Mexican-inspired cuisines, such as Tex-Mex and Southwestern United States dishes. It comes in differen ...

s) or pressing out small quantities of onion or

shallot The shallot is a cultivar group of the onion. Until 2010, the (French red) shallot was classified as a separate species, ''Allium ascalonicum''. The taxon was synonymized with '' Allium cepa'' (the common onion) in 2010, as the difference was t ...

juice.

Collection

The largest collection of unique garlic presses is thought to be owned by Tord Elfwendahl, Stockholm, who has since 1979 collected an excess of 1200 unique garlic presses.

Notes

{{Kitchen tools Food preparation utensils Garlic Swiss inventions

Collection

See also

Notes