Garlic Time
Plant garlic now and reap your own crop next summer
Last week’s Star Valley Farmers Market in Alpine had a new, lone vegetable vendor; a farmer was selling garlic bulbs. At $2 for one bulb, the price was reasonable for locally produced garlic. The variety was Zema, and the bulbs were small and white with four cloves per bulb. The farmer had no other vegetables and no other varieties of garlic available. We purchased two bulbs and were impressed with the robust flavor when the bulb was rubbed on a grilled piece of sourdough bread for bruschetta. The Zema cultivar originated in Zema Surebi in the Republic of Georgia and is well-suited to cold climates. It is popular in Montana with specialty seed garlic purveyors.
In Jackson, at the farmers market, the bulbs of garlic from one specialty grower are sold by the pound, and my friend Cynthia purchased one bulb that came to $4.20. That’s high for garlic, but we were on the square in Jackson near the Wagyu beef stand and near Cosmic Apple, the organic vegetable stand, where I paid $9.00 for a bag of fava beans that yielded barely half a cup of shelled favas.
It’s a pricey town, but I must remember that I’m not in a region where the soil is conducive to growing vegetables. Wyoming soil is great for grasses, which the cattle eat, so ranching is a much bigger industry than farming.
When I went to the Idaho Falls Farmers Market yesterday, I found a great garlic vendor with many different varieties for sale. Art Urquidi operates Blackfoot Gardens in Blackfoot, Idaho, and he grew 17 varieties this year. He has been growing garlic for 14 years and grew 3000 plants this season. His price was $3.50 per bulb or four bulbs for $12.00. I purchased four fat bulbs, and he threw in an extra one after we chatted about his enterprise.
It’s a good time of year to think about garlic because now is the time to plant it. Like tulips and daffodils, garlic is a bulb that must go into the ground before the earth freezes. Since the garlic cloves should be planted four to six weeks before the first frost, October is perfect timing. It is best to plant garlic that has been produced locally, so get your bulbs at the farmers market, if possible, though you can also plant garlic from the supermarket. California produces 84 % of the fresh garlic sold in US grocery stores today, but China rules the world market, growing 66% of the global garlic crop.
In 2008, weary of fighting groundhog wars over zucchini and tomatoes, John planted garlic—420 cloves of it—in our State College garden. Some we had purchased at the Ithaca farmers market were sold as “seed” garlic, which means bulbs meant to be taken apart and planted. Those ten bulbs yielded about 80 astonishingly vigorous cloves when they grew into green shoots in the spring, true to their Old English namesake, gārlēac, which translates as “spear leek.” The remaining cloves were from local farmers’ markets but were not explicitly marketed for planting. John was busy in the spring, removing the scapes on the hardneck varieties so the plant’s energy would go to the bulb.
Cultivated since Neolithic times, garlic, allium sativum, is a member of the lily family, closely related to onions, chives, leeks, and shallots. The word allium comes from the Latin “to exhale.” The plant originated in southwest Siberia or Central Asia and then spread to southern Europe, where it became naturalized. Chinese texts dating back to 2000 BCE speak of the healing properties of garlic, and their use by ancient Egyptians and Greeks is well-documented. The builders of the pyramids were paid in garlic, which enabled them to maintain their stamina, and garlic was found in King Tutankhamun’s tomb to help him prepare for the afterlife.
While its medicinal properties have long been praised, some writers, like Horace and later Shakespeare, regarded garlic as a symbol of vulgarity. The historically bland nature of the English diet may primarily be due to a class-conscious avoidance of the pungent plant. Indeed, there still seem to be two types of people: those who love the alliums (me) and those who hate them (my brother), and the twain can have a difficult time compromising.
While there are over 450 identifiable strains of garlic they can be divided into two primary divisions. Hardneck garlic, allium sativum ophioscorodon, is characterized by a hard, woody flower stalk as thick as a pencil. The cloves of this variety are huge, sometimes just a few cloves per bulb, and they are relatively easy to peel. This type includes the Rocamboles and other exotic heirloom varieties highly prized by chefs for their distinctive characteristics. Softneck garlic, allium sativum sativum, has no stem, the top of the bulb is smooth, and the bulbs have many more cloves that are more difficult to peel. Softneck garlic is the type that is cultivated commercially, mainly in California and Texas, because it has a longer shelf life. It is also the type that is used to braid garlic wreaths because you can wind the bulbs together.
Garlic has long been used as a medicine, and recent scientific research supports early claims. The key beneficial element is the allyl sulfur compounds activated when the garlic clove is crushed or cut. Allowing the garlic to rest exposed to air promoted maximum activation and increased anticancer benefit in tests done at Penn State in 2000. Additional Penn State research documents garlic’s cholesterol-lowering ability. Other purported health benefits include lowering blood pressure, strengthening the immune system, and acting as an anti-fungal, antibiotic, and antiviral agent. Garlic is a powerful antioxidant that protects cell membranes and DNA from damage by free oxygen radicals.
Check out this YouTube video if you want to try growing your own garlic this year. Maybe you will agree that it is chic to reek!
Garlic Potatoes Anna
Six to eight servings
6 Russet potatoes, peeled
8 tablespoons melted butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt
2 bulbs of garlic, (yes!) about 8-16 cloves, minced
1/4 cup minced chives
Preheat the oven to 375° F. Slice the potatoes thinly, about one-fourth of an inch thick, and soak the slices in ice water for 10 minutes. Drain and pat dry with a dishtowel. In a large sauté pan that can go in the oven, heat two tablespoons of the melted butter and the two tablespoons of oil until you can smell the fats, but don’t brown them. Arrange the potatoes in the pan in concentric circles until the base layer is in place, shaking the pan occasionally so the potatoes don’t stick. When you have a layer on the bottom, sprinkle with salt and dot with the minced garlic and chives. Drizzle a little more melted butter on the first layer and then continue layering the rest of the potato slices in the pan, sprinkling with salt, minced garlic, and chives and drizzling with butter until you have filled the pan. Keep shaking the pan so the potatoes on the bottom don’t stick. Cover the pan with a lid or foil and bake in the oven for 45 minutes to an hour. Remove from the oven and gently check the bottom to ensure the potatoes aren’t stuck. Carefully--and prayerfully--flip the sauté pan onto a serving platter and serve.
Important notes: One caution about using this plant: garlic can be harmful if stored at room temperature in oil. Bacteria naturally occurring in the soil are easily killed by heat and exposure to air. Keeping garlic in an anaerobic environment like oil at room temperature can result in botulism. Fresh garlic bulbs, like onions, should be stored at room temperature and used before green shoots start growing. When using garlic, mince the cloves when you want to cook them, and crush them when using the garlic is a fresh preparation, like a salad dressing. Crushed garlic tends to scorch in a sauté pan. Garlic should not be browned but should turn translucent during cooking.
Some parts of this article appeared previously in the Centre Daily Times in 2005, 2009, or 2011. It is one of my favorite topics!
So cool! Great recipe