A Garlic We Will Grow

I love garlic! (Allium) I love everything about it….I love the smell of it as a seed bulb when it first arrives in the mail, full grown, and of course later cooked in a myriad of ways. I think our bodies crave what is good for us and whatever it is this gal is sold! I remember the first time I had it roasted by itself with a little bit of olive oil drizzled over it I just about swooned. My Mom had a friend prepare it that way for her and she came home and made it for us and we served it with a baguette and wow my senses were just amazed!

I don’t know if you listen to my former radio show on the Prepper Broadcasting Network but I have an episode where I interviewed Annie Haven about “Know Your Soil” we stumbled on to the topic of garlic and my lack of ability to grow it. Ironically I never got around to touching base with some of the bloggers she recommended however I had a lightbulb moment. I thought well we buy the bulk of our herbs from Shelton Herb Farm which is a local farm why not buy our garlic from a North Carolina based company and then I just googled…seed companies in Asheville, North Carolina. This is a destination the Viking and I visit every chance we get and sure enough they had a seed company; Sow True Seed I have since ordered the catalog and ordered more seeds for Spring from them however I digress.

We ordered garlic form Sow True Seed this past September it arrived in October and we planted it in late October/Early November (we are awful at record keeping). We ordered two kinds and the I am pleased to report the garlic is thriving. We ordered some softneck garlic and hardneck garlic and both are doing great. I can barely contain my excitement as you can tell 😉

Softneck garlic(Allium sativum) which is what you usually see in the supermarket;   I realized after some research we had not grown before on our lil’ homestead very excitingly yields lots of garlic bulbs – I am so excited for this next gardening adventure. We should expect a yield of approximately 10 to 20 bulbs per bulb planted….Wow!  The softneck variety is also braidable for long-term storage.

Hardneck garlic   (Allium sativum var. ophioscorodon) produces a stem through the center of the bulb which produces those lovely garlic scapes and the umbel (a pod which produces bulbils). Since I am new to growing garlic I am going to recommend you read further about this at Mother Earth News because they have a wealth of information at their site!  I am really hoping these turn out because this type of garlic is better suited to areas that have cold winters.

Garlic is loaded with phytochemicals which help increase immune function as well as lower your blood pressure so lots of other good reasons to eat your garlic in addition to the fact that it just tastes amazing!

I am already planning my “foodie” projects with our garlic…in the past we would get the garlic scapes and not the bulbs and someone told me it’s because it doesn’t get cold enough in Coastal North Carolina but I have learned as I referenced above this is due to the different types of garlic but I can promise you whatever this garlic produces will be used to it’s fullest. You can put the flowers in salads, you can make pesto with the garlic scapes. I have so many plans for our garlic!  

I am hoping that growing garlic will become a permanent part of our gardenscape in the future “no pun intended”…;)

I wish you all a beautiful week….until next time!