According to world-famous French chef Jacques Pépin, all you need to separate garlic cloves is your hands and a decent chef's knife.

In many of his television appearances and internet videos, Pépin uses this neat trick to get the cloves apart when he's cooking a recipe with garlic.

Place the bulb with the root side angled down on a hard, flat surface like a cutting board, then hit it slightly off-center with your palm.

The cloves will all come apart if you get a good, solid hit. Pépin says this works really well if the bulb is a little bit on the drier side.

Once you get the cloves apart, you'll have to peel the garlic. While the cloves are sticky and the skin can be tough to crack and peel, Pépin has a simple method.

Cut the stems off the cloves and place one on your cutting board. Lay your knife flat atop the clove and tap it with a heavy knife, or slam your palm on the top side of the blade.

This motion cracks the skin and loosens the clove so it easily slips out the bottom of its casing when you pick it up by the pointy end (opposite where the stem was).