Make Your Own Garlic Olive Oil

• 10 to 12 oz olive oil (see note)
• 1 head garlic
• very small saucepan, flame-tamer, spoon, instant-read thermometer
• funnel, mesh strainer, clean glass bottle with tight-fitting stopper

Smash the garlic cloves and peel them.  Put them in the saucepan with the oil.  Put it on the flame-tamer on the stove over medium-low heat. 

After about 10 minutes, the oil should reach around 250F and the garlic cloves should start sizzling and float to the top.  Stir them around a bit to make sure they're all immersed in oil.  Adjust the flame to keep the oil at 250F, and leave it alone for 15-20 minutes.

At the end of this time, the garlic should be a golden caramel color and the oil should smell very strongly of garlic.  Set up the funnel in the bottle, and the strainer above it, and carefully pour the oil through the strainer and funnel into the bottle, while still hot.  You may want gloves or mitts for this.

Save the caramelized garlic cloves in the fridge; they keep for about a week and are delicious as part of garlic bread.  Stopper the oil and keep in the pantry; it should be good for about 3 to 4 months, depending on the ambient temperature.

Notes:

There's no point in using expensive virgin olive oil for this, since the garlic will overwhelm all flavor.  Use a cheap olive oil instead.

In order to be safe from botulism, it's very important that you strain all solids out of the oil when bottling it, so use a metal strainer with a fairly tight mesh.  Make sure the bottle is absolutely clean.