How to Store Garlic Confit Safely and Avoid Botulism

Recently, I was asked to list my top three condiments of all time. It’s easy conversation bait for any voracious home cook—and one I could personally discuss for hours. Except this time, my one-track brain could only fixate on the condiment I’ve been making religiously this year: garlic confit.

I cycle through jars of homemade garlic confit like a thirsty pigeon flocking to a fountain. I’m always dreaming up ways to use it in sandwiches, sauces, dips, or slick, slurpable pastas. It’s so easy to make, too: Take a handful of peeled garlic cloves, submerge them in high-quality extra-virgin olive oil, then cook them at a bare simmer on the stovetop or in the oven—about one to three hours—until the garlic softens and mellows.

Even as I willingly lap up garlic confit by the spoonful, I’m always mindful of working through my stash quickly. That’s because storing garlic confit for longer than a week increases the risk of botulism, a rare but dangerous illness caused by a neurotoxin that attacks the body’s nervous system. That may sound alarming, but the risk can be greatly reduced as long as you store the condiment properly, which I’ll explain how to do in a bit.

What Exactly Is Garlic Confit?

Garlic confit is called confit—literally “to preserve” in French—because it’s cooked and stored in the very same oil. The result is what I like to call a delicious culinary double-header: Both the roasted cloves and the intensely flavorful oil can be added to all kinds of dishes. The longer the garlic sits in the oil, the more infused the oil becomes.

The term “confit” historically refers to meat cooked and preserved in its own fat, such as duck confit. In a traditional recipe for duck confit, duck legs are first salted to draw out the moisture and lightly cured for 24 to 48 hours. After rinsing off the cure and patting the legs dry, the meat is submerged in rendered duck fat and heated in the oven for three hours. Once the fat cools to room temperature, the duck is refrigerated in its fat, then crisped up on the stove and eaten.

Unlike duck, most vegetables don’t contain a lot of fat, so oil must be used to make a confit with them. In the case of garlic confit, olive oil is ideal for the job, as its grassy undertones complement the mellow sweetness of the slow-cooked garlic. With enough time in the oven or on the stove, the garlic becomes soft and spreadable, and its harsh bite mellows, resulting in tender cloves with a sweet, deeply umami flavor.

As much as I wish my garlic confit could last forever, all good things in life come with an expiration date.

Why You Should Never Store Garlic Confit at Room Temperature

The risk of keeping garlic confit for too long? Botulism. It’s a serious foodborne illness caused by neurotoxins produced by Clostridium botulinum. Left untreated, botulism can lead to muscle paralysis and, in rare cases, death. While the spores themselves are common in soil and marine sediments and are typically harmless, they become dangerous under certain conditions. In a low-oxygen, low-acid, and low-sugar environment—such as the one in which garlic confit is made and stored—bacteria can proliferate rapidly and produce neurotoxins.

Still, the actual risk of botulism in garlic confit is relatively low: Most documented outbreaks have involved raw garlic blended with oil and stored at room temperature—which, technically speaking, is not garlic confit.

While investigating the ideal storage time for garlic confit, I encountered discrepancies. Some garlic confit recipes adhere strictly to the USDA’s recommendation to store garlic confit at 40°F (4.4°C) or below and discard it after seven days. (This advice is based on a study of garlic and oil stored at room temperature.) Other reputable sources, however, claim that refrigerated garlic confit can last up to two weeks.

Why the inconsistency? I contacted Don Schaffnerchair of the Department of Food Science at Rutgers University, to help clarify.

“We know definitively that if you put garlic in oil at room temperature and leave it out for long periods, the possibility of developing botulinum toxin is quite high,” he told me. That discrepancy you see online comes down to fridge temperature. “We know that temperatures of home refrigerators can be quite different, and some people have fridges that are quite cold while others do not,” Schaffner explains.

Schaffner pointed me to a paper about the mathematical relationship between temperature and time for C. botulinum toxin production. (The study is observational and designed to guide safety practices, not to draw statistically significant conclusions.) Using this formula and some back-of-the-napkin calculations, he showed that the difference in relative risk at 40°F (4.4°C), which is the USDA recommendation for refrigeration, and 38°F (3.3°C), which he considers nice, cold refrigeration, is roughly one week.

The takeaway here is that if your fridge temperature is uncertain or fluctuates, it’s safest to store garlic confit for no longer than one week, then toss it. But if you have a fridge thermometer to confirm your fridge stays at or below 38°F (3.3°C), storing garlic confit for up to two weeks should likely be fine, though I personally prefer to err on the side of caution and use it within a week.

How to Properly Store Garlic Confit

Once your garlic confit is done cooking, transfer the confit and the cooking oil to a clean heatproof container, cover, and refrigerate immediately. Use clean utensils to scoop out any oil or softened garlic cloves, and consume within one week. (Alternatively, you can freeze the garlic confit for several months and thaw it in the fridge when you’re ready to consume it.) Professor Schaffner recommends this for long-term storage, since “once you freeze something, the risk of botulism becomes essentially zero if the food is kept frozen.” Most importantly, do not store garlic confit at room temperature under any circumstances.

What to Use Garlic Confit On?

Garlic confit adds a wonderfully deep sweetness to just about anything you can purée, mash, or fold it into. Recipes such as creamy bean dip or spaghetti aglio e olio are garlic confit no-brainers—just use garlic confit in place of fresh garlic. You can also blitz it into soups, sauces, and vinaigrettes; top toasts and sandwiches with it; spoon it over juicy poached shrimp and tender steak; and perk up salads and vegetables that need a touch of savoriness. I occasionally incorporate other alliums, such as charred scallions, leeks, and shallots, for an extra boost of rich, caramelized sweetness.