Karamaya Black Garlic with Ralph Butcher

You can find Karamaya Black Garlic at Raeward Fresh stores in
Richmond & Marshland

Ralph Butcher is a refiner and a gift to the NZ food scene. He’s a long term champion of organics with a strong background in chemistry who’s also found a way to tap into ancient production techniques to create a modern ingredient for todays haute cuisine. Ralph produces black garlic, a slow cooked (at low temps and high humidity) luxurious food that remains alive right up to serving on an oatcake with cheese, over eggs in an omelette or in a home made gelato. With flavor notes both sweet and acidic, it carries both caramel and chocolate hints as well as a very smooth garlic taste for savoury dishes. Ralph takes this raw potential and refines the whole process from home-made organic compost to additive-free production, all part of his storied approach to boutique food production.

Ralph grew up on a dairy farm in Norsewood, Southern Hawke's Bay. He studied chemistry and worked at Victoria University in Wellington where he helped set up one of New Zealand’s first NMR spectrophotometers. This is where Ralph first saw his gift in refining processes as he calibrated sixteen potentiometers to align the powerful electromagnet to the maximum field homogeneity (whatever the hell that is). This level of technical skill was only the beginning of Ralph’s adventures. He went on to fine tune Dominion Salt’s brine treatment process to produce the worlds purest salt at the time. From there Ralph was involved in adopting and adapting processes from around the world (including the Mogensen Sizer) in the creation of New Zealand food products, a talent that reflects the values and skills of many of the producers we’ve highlighted in this blog. It’s that kiwi ability to look abroad for ideas and bring them home with innovation and aplomb. 

---

With all this technical skill under his belt, Ralph returned to his farming roots and took a serious look at soil, especially compost. Ralph was probably New Zealand’s first producer of organic compost and potting mix and had developed seven products to show that any plant at any stage in it's life (seedling, cutting - right through to a mature plant) could be completely sustained from composted natural materials and waste nutrients. In fact, the unique soil that Ralph produced has now become the basis for his garlic beds at Karamaya. This is worth noting as there a growing number of black garlic producers around the world but few have the rich flavour and inherent sweetness that comes of Ralph’s entire process and I would argue, his soil. The six week period Ralph gives his compost (made from natural organic materials and byproducts) to break down and form is about the same time that he cures his garlic for, creating a rich black colour not dissimilar to that of his soil. Hmm, very Karmic? 

The results of Ralph’s refinements in growth and curing are astounding. The 13,000 bulbs of garlic Ralph harvests and slow cooks for 6 weeks has an off-the-chart Brix reading of over 35. Brix measures a plants maturity, overall nutrition and sweetness. A mature peach for example is about 18 on the Brix scale and a fantastic cherry can reach the mid 20’s. At over 35 Birx, Ralph’s black garlic has reached a peak sweetness and nutrient dense maturity that when added to sweet or savoury foods, resonates with intense deliciousness and antioxidant goodness. The S-allyl cysteine developed in garlic cooked this long is a powerhouse nutritionally as the rich caramel flavour is in various recipes. Ralph hires a commercial kitchen to process and capture this goodness but does not use any preservatives or additives along the way, they’re completely unnecessary in this ancient / new superfood. 

While selling fresh garlic to chefs around the country, Ralph first discovered black garlic from the head chef at the Grand Chancellor in Wellington. Once Ralph was onto this product he set about refining and adding his own skills to create this caviar of garlic. Karamaya Black garlic is now used at the Grand Chancellor and many other restaurants around the country. It’s culinary use is only recently being fully developed and Ralph is further refining this process himself working on dessert chocolates, mousses and toppings / sauces. This would make black garlic even more accessible to the average foodie so watch this space. In the mean time, you can get Karamaya Black garlic in small tubs ready for your own culinary refinements. Here’s a few recipes to get you going:

---

A couple of simple recipes from Ralph
• Try 180 degrees crackers, a soft cheese, smoked salmon, and a mushroom/black garlic
mixture to top it off
For the mushroom combo, Raplph lightly salts the mushrooms and lets them stand before cooking with a bit of olive oil, and then mixing in about 1/3 ratio of black garlic to the cooked mushrooms. 

• Fried bananas with black garlic/fruit toppings on ice cream
Some vanilla bean ice cream, black garlic to taste, fried bananas and chopped almonds to taste.

---

A couple recipes from us:

Star Anise and Black Garlic gelato

Ingredients
5 large egg yolks
3/4 cup sugar
2 1/4 cups whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
1 tsp vanilla
4 dried star anise
1 tbsp black garlic

Method
• In a large bowl whisk together the egg yolks and the sugar until thick and creamy.

• Combine the milk, heavy cream, star anise and vanilla, Heat the mixture until it starts to bubble on the edges. Don’t let it boil. Remove from the heat.

• While whisking the egg mixture add about a cup of the warm milk mixture and combine together. Then add in the rest of the egg mixture to the milk. Heat the entire mixture slowly until it thickens. The custard should coat the back of a wooden spoon. Don’t allow the custard to simmer.

• Strain the custard through a fine mesh sieve.

• Stir in the black garlic until it’s well distributed, cover and refrigerate until well chilled.

• You can transfer this custard into the ice cream maker and follow manufacturer's instructions. If you don't have one, place the gelato in the freezer and stir with a fork every 30 minutes for a few hours.

---

---

Sunny side eggs with Black garlic over sourdough toast

• This one’s easy. Toast your favourite sourdough bread and set on the plate. Butter and add some baby spinach or rocket leaves if you like. Fry your eggs in a hot cast iron skillet until cooked on one side but don’t flip. When the egg white’s are cooked, but the yolk is still partially runny (that’s the ‘sunny side’), place on your toast and greens. Then add a bit of cracked pepper and flakey sea salt and top with a teaspoon of Karamaya Black garlic. 

---