Garlic

This Viral Hack for Peeling Garlic Is Taking Over Twitter

You'll never crush or shake a clove of garlic again.

June 18, 2019

I've always been a fan of simple yet wildly clever kitchen hacks that make mundane tasks faster and easier. My most recent discovery was this trick for juicing a lemon—without using a knife. It sounds impossible, I know. But it's not.

Neither is my newest find: a maneuver for peeling garlic that seems to defy everything I've ever been taught about, well, how to peel garlic.

In the video posted to Twitter, you can see someone holding an entire head of garlic (unpeeled of course) and using what looks to be a small paring knife (but what one Facebook commenter pointed out could be one half of a pair of kitchen scissors) to twist each clove straight out of its shell at an impressively quick rate.

Unsurprisingly, the video has swept like wildfire across the internet—even our beloved Chrissy Teigen has retweeted the video to her millions upon millions of followers. Her caption, true to form: "WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT."

Join The Conversation

Top Comment:
“Would it have been that difficult to try it and report back, rather than just summarizing tweets for clicks? What is the point of this article. ”
— atxdori
Comment

But my biggest question is: Does this viral garlic-peeling hack actually work? Much like its lemon and pineapple hack predecessors, the answer is a bit of a mixed bag. One of Chrissy's Twitter followers found it to work like a charm. "This person is obviously more proficient, but in principle it worked; the garlic just popped out when I stabbed and twisted it," Patrick Alba wrote. Like us, he felt "so betrayed for not being taught this before."

Others, though, reported less success. Twitter user Rebecca Reid declared, "We have tried it in our office and it DOES NOT WORK." And there is an important point to be made about safety: You probably don't want to try this hack unless you're fairly skilled with a paring knife, otherwise you might run the risk of cutting yourself.

Still, this newfound garlic-peeling wisdom has me thinking that I ought to leave my desk right now and head to the grocery store across the street, pick up a head of garlic, and give it a try for myself. Because, if it does indeed work, you can bet I'll be making this roast chicken with 40 gloves of garlic (yes, 40) for dinner tonight—and probably every night for the rest of this week. And don't worry, I'll update this post to let you know the results.

What's your favorite kitchen hack? Tell us in the comments below!
Grab your copy

It's here: Our game-changing guide to everyone's favorite room in the house. Your Do-Anything Kitchen gathers the smartest ideas and savviest tricks—from our community, test kitchen, and cooks we love—to help transform your space into its best self.

Grab your copy

See what other Food52 readers are saying.

  • arbeenyc
    arbeenyc
  • piggledy
    piggledy
  • Bruno Martins
    Bruno Martins
  • Beth Kriegsman
    Beth Kriegsman
  • janet
    janet
Erin Alexander

Written by: Erin Alexander

Erin Alexander is the Managing Editor of Food52.

11 Comments

arbeenyc February 23, 2023
Looks like the video has been deleted.
 
piggledy June 22, 2019
Separating the cloves, placing them in a small jar (with lid), and shaking vigorously works for me, and it is less likely that the clumsy among us will injure themselves with the knife. Or, just squish between the cutting board and the broad side of a knife.
 
Bruno M. June 21, 2019
Microwave it for a minute before try!
 
Beth K. June 18, 2019
Could it have something to do with the variety of garlic? She’s holding a hard neck type, that typically has one row of thick cloves, doesn’t store that well. The other post with the pink garlic skins is likely a hard neck too. Supermarket garlic with lots of tiny cloves might be harder.
 
janet June 18, 2019
worked for me as well - and fwiw...if it did split a few heads...why do i care? it's quick and i already have a knife out usually.
 
atxdori June 18, 2019
Would it have been that difficult to try it and report back, rather than just summarizing tweets for clicks? What is the point of this article.
 
Shari R. June 18, 2019
Why so cynical?
 
Matt June 19, 2019
I too, would have preferred they try this out and video their own results.
 
Lauren E. June 18, 2019
Since I am currently making hummus, I decided to try this and to my amazement it worked for me! I suspect it won't work with fresher garlic from the farmers market but it totally worked on head I got from the grocery store.
 
Erin A. June 18, 2019
Ahhhh that is so exciting to hear! Thank you for sharing, Lauren!
 
Smaug June 18, 2019
That's the thing with this sort of video, and with TV chefs in general- if you carefully select your produce to be easily dealt with a lot of things are very easy, but most of us don't have that luxury. A head of garlic that peels this easily is going to be pretty easy by any method.