Dug up this recipe from my collection of ripped-out magazine pages while looking for a new appetizer to serve at our annual Navroz gathering last weekend. The words roasted and garlic go so well together, and they caught my eye as I flipped through the pages. I loved that the ingredients were fresh, nutritious and real and that it was easy enough to twist into my own creation. That I did. And here was the result:

Roasted Garlic & Herb Pitas – makes 4 pitas

Here’s what you need:

24 cloves garlic, roasted

1/4 cup olive oil

1 cup parsley, finely chopped

1/4 tomato, chopped

1 tsp salt

Here’s what you do:

To roast the garlic, peel and separate the cloves and toss them in a little olive oil so they are just coated. Cook them on a baking tray in a 300F oven for at least 15 minutes (I kept them in for 20 so they were nice and soft and brown).

In a bowl, mash the roasted garlic as much as you can with a fork. Add the rest of the ingredients and continue mashing. Throw everything into the blender to help get a creamy consistency. Spread on toasted pitas. Cut the pitas into 4’s to make them the perfect stuff-your-mouth size.

And there you go! As my son would say: easy-peasy, lemon squeezy!

You can pretty much spread these on any bread! Because the garlic is roasted, it’s actually not as pungent but still has all the immune-boosting benefits. The greens add some chlorophyll and vitamin C to the mix, and if you throw in other herbs like oregano and basil, you’d only increase those good things.

If you have a simple, nutritious appetizer recipe that I must try, leave it in the comments!