Garlic Lovers Thread - Growing and Eating in the MAF

Here is what I posted on our fall swap thread.


Sally and I met up with Garlic Man at Farmers Mart on Sat. He's been growing garlic on a large scale for almost 10myears on a half acre. Of the nine varieties he grows, the following will be available at our swap. Eat them or grow them or both!



Elephant Garlic $2

Hardnecks
Chesnok Red $.75
Music $.75
German White $.75

Softnecks
Oregon Blue $.75
Wiiamette $.25

reserved
sticking in some resources here for future reference

The Many Uses of Garlic - http://perrysperennials.info/articles/garlicben.html

Elephant Garlic - http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/allium/msg0620360429399.html

Nichols - https://www.nicholsgardennursery.com/store/product-list.php?pg1-cid111.html

http://www.territorialseed.com/product/11136

On-line garlic farmers market
http://www.gourmetgarlicgardens.com/growers.html

vermont http://www.greenmountaingarlic.com/shop/garlic/

http://2sistersgarlic.com/varieties.htm

local harvest http://www.localharvest.org/store/M19189
http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/market-farming/2009-July/030495.html

http://fxcuisine.com/Default.asp?Display=151

http://www.thedailygreen.com/green-homes/blogs/organic-gardening/growing-garlic-460709





http://www.recipe.com/blogs/cooking/garlic-recipes-ten-things-you-didnt-kno/

This message was edited Oct 2, 2012 7:46 PM

Sign me up!! I'll try one of each!

I planted grocery store garlis last year with great results. So I'm looking forward to these even better kinds.

I'll take 3 heads each of the hardnecks, please. They can go in as the Amaryllis bulbs come out this fall, I think. I'll send $7 with somebody or swap for a pound of moisture crystals. :-)

um Jill, that might kinda blow thru ''our inventory'' LOL! Unless Judy is kind enough to get more.
(Which knowing Judy she may very well be)

Looking at some internet sites- they are already sold out on quite a few items. Another reason to Grow Yer Own!

Close to 98 percent of all garlic in our grocery stores, etc is produced in China and is of the variety 'China white'

Here is a link to the website of what Fortune magazine calls the garlic industry's equivalent to Nike or Coca Cola
http://www.prettygarlic.com/

I believe there are 17 sub types of garlic, which is in the allium family (onions), and over 600 varieties! So we are just scratching the surface here,

What is nice about buying locally grown garlic and supporting our local farmers and economy is that local garlic when planted is already acclimated to our area winter/spring weather temps! Garlic Man did make clear that the garlic I am bringing to our swap that he grows and sells is for consumption, (He told S and I that he saves the best 200 bulbs of each variety to replant his own fields and brings any extra to the market.)

Critterologist, Jill< that is absolutely clever, to alternate garlic and amaryllis! Have you done this before? Read about it? Just thunk it up on your own?

I was already planning to meet up with Garlic Man to get his positive ID of several bulbs I bought from him a month ago that I think are German White which he is currently 'sold out of'. I also have some very small bulbs of German White from my own harvest (and bulbils, too) and want to get his opinion on whether being so small, the cloves would 'make a head' next year or take two to mature.

So, yes, I can restock our " inventory" up to. and including, the 7 am opening of the Farmers Mart the day of the swap! And, next fall if the sun shines and the rain falls and we keep our garlic patches weed free we should have our own to swap!

Below is a pic of my harvest . They were grown in containers and if any one here thinks I have any expertize in garlic growing...I thought they were some left over unharvested onions that were going to seed this spring and yanked them out way early and certainly didn't treat them like a good garlic grower would! But, that was then and this is now....

Cool beans

Coleup -- can I try 3 of each, please? And I'm happy to pay for and/or pick up for Critter...

Chantell and terp, got you covered,

Critter and Happy got you both covered for up to three of each variety.

*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_*_

Hey Sally, who knew? Seems at least one of our field of dreams will be planted in garlic!

Grow it and they will come

Yippee, that means I will have to see Happy after the swap!

Coleup, I haven't done it before but thought about it (too late) last fall as I was lifting the amaryllises. I figure I can stick garlic cloves in easily when I dig up the big amaryllis bulbs. I'll be planting the amaryllis out in the garden before the garlic is ready, probably, but it shouldn't be a big deal to work around the garlic and find enough space for the amaryllis. Or I can let the amaryllises stay in their pots until the garlic is ready to pull...

lol Some think that garlic tends to keep people at a distance but here it seems to bring us together!




Garlic Man plants 3 - 4 inches apart (pointy end up). Might throw some nourishment in those amaryllis holes cause garlic like to eat. He says they really don't need to be planted deeper that you would an onion set, with elephant garlic a little deeper and father apart.

Sally, were we taking notes?

Oh yes, cut the flower scapes on hardnecks for bigger bulbs. Hardnecks take more work (cutting flower scapes which do not all bloom at the same time) than softnecks. Generally hardnecks don't keep as long as softneck (6-8 mos versus 3-4 for )

This message was edited Sep 3, 2012 6:05 PM

coleup - I'd like 4 bulbs each of Chesnok Red and Music. Thanks

Took note- he told us to plant garlic cloves about five inches apart, closer than we thought.

Watching for garlic scapes seems like an easy task for us hobby gardeners who will be strolling the garden frequently anyway.

From my own notes- planted my presumed China White in early October and the tops all fell in late May.I think every clove grew. I have eaten the smaller bulbs first and you'll see what I have left by swap. One that I put in the produce drawer went bad but the ones I have stored warm and dry are still looking totally good. So they're about at 3 months now from harvest.

wooooowhoooo! This is exciting!! Judy, thanks to you and Sally - dmail me what I owe you please and thank you!!

Oh -- so you harvested in May? I don't know why I was thinking July... Harvesting in May or June would be perfect timing for putting the amaryllises back out there.

Thanks, I wasn't thinking of putting the garlic cloves at the very bottom of the hole, more like thinking that digging up the amaryllis will give me a nice little area of "worked" soil. Darius did a series of informative articles on garlic... see her articles (or search articles for "garlic") if you're wondering "what's a softneck?" etc.

http://davesgarden.com/sitewidesearch.php?q=Garlic

THanks for the link, Chantell! (got my back, again)

:-)

Think Dionne Warwick "That's what friends are for..

:-)

And if no garlic comes my way this fall, no worries... those who are successful growing it this time around will hopefully save a few extra heads to share with the rest of us next fall!

Just got back from the Tuesday Morning Farmers Market.

Seems that Garlic Man has taken a liking to us!

So much so that he will bring two bulbs of his "hottest" variety, 'Georgian Fire' for me this Sat morn. That's pretty cool since those two bulbs are from his planting stock! (The biggest and best of the harvest}

He said to tell everyone who is going to plant that " the first year the cloves do a lot of acclimating to individual soil and weather conditions and then really take off the second year."
"Elephant garlic gets about 3 feet tall and needs 5 inches of space all around to mature properly. Plant it 4-5 inches deep."

And, soo much more....but later for that.

Chantell, I'm putting your name on a Georgian Fire!
http://www.groworganic.com/garlic-georgian-fire-organic-lb.html

My hand is waving for the fire!

I see it waving! Maybe we will have to break it down to the clove level!

As Sally intimates, we are getting a real bargain here with Garlic man. Seed garlic goes for around $18 per pound (2-4 bulbs) plus shipping. (see prices on above link to Georgian Fire) Garlic Man says it is just not cost efficient for him to introduce more varieties than he currently offers. It would take 4 years or so to grow enough stock seed to begin offering it for sale. He currently plants 10 500foot rows in garlic. That's a lot of hand planting! But he is partial to growing garlic. onions and potatoes because you plant them once and then harvest them...no fiddlin with them in between, and no bugs!

Just priced elephant garlic at Whole Foods at $4.99 a bulb

I once grew Georgian Fire. It is REALLY hot garlic! A peeled clove held passivly in the mouth set my whole mouth on fire. Tamer once cooked. Enjoy.

greenthumb, what others have you grown?

Spanish Roja, Purple Italian Easy Peel and Purple Glazer are the only others. All were excellent in their own way, but Georgian Fire made the greatest impression.

Wow, this is all way cool.

I'll be looking out at the grocery store for a purple skinned bulb possibly-easy-peel IF by chance they still offer that once in a while. My China Whites are hard to peel. That last layer of thin skin really sticks.

Sally - all the garlics I grew were hardnecks, so you are unlikely to find Purple Italian Easy Peel in the grocery. I am restricted to the white grocery garlic most of the time and find that it peels easily if I press hard on it with the flat of my chef's knife until the skin pops. Then the skin comes right off.

Okey doke- I have at some time seen some sort of a grocery garlic with purple skins. Could have been tem years ago tho lol.
I've heard the knife trick, and imagine I tried it, but will try again.

Ah... so maybe this first fall we just need to split up an assortment of cloves (don't necessarily need a whole head) so we get a handful of "better adapted" cloves to plant next year... ?

I think that's a great idea Jill!

Critter, I think Garlic man is surprised that there are a number of us who want to plant the garlic he grows and want to know how he does what he does and why. Actually he reminds me of us here on Daves and the spirit behind our swaps and that keeps us coming back and passing on.

He told me he doesn't grow garlic because it's a big money maker , but because he likes garlic! And he likes growing it.! Now, he will get some feedback and questions and stories on how his garlic grows for each of us in this garlic lovers adventure in MAF.

So I take his comment to us about..."it really takes off the second year" as a way of saying he hopes we won"t be disappointed.

To clarify, the garlic I'll be bringing to the swap is better adapted than any we could order. Having a bulb or two of each variety, we can plant some and eat some and next June July harvest enough to replant, eat and eventually share with others.

This message was edited Sep 4, 2012 11:00 PM

OK, Y'all are confusing me as the procurer of these assorted garlic bulbs!

Yep, trying one of each or several kinds is a great idea but if you only get one clove, you can only eat or plant it, not both. If you plant it and it doesn't yield a full head, you're sort of back to square one.

To simplify things for me, the minimum quantity available of each variety is one bulb, not by the clove. For planting purposes, the bulb should be kept intact until planting time (which is mid Oct) to minimize possibility of drying out, etc. If you only want to plant one clove...just eat the rest of your bulb!

I heartily agree there that each person will want a whole head of any given kind.
Plant all the cloves or use the smallest for tasters.

Wooooowhooooo....tell Garlic Man we owe him a garlicy smooch-a-roo!!

lol Chantell! He did sort of blush when I told him we call him Garlic Man!

Tell him we'd gladly feed him should he like to do a 30 min (or more) Garlic for Dummies presentation at Sally's

That is a great idea Chantell.

Thank you Terp. Sally - would that be ok with you? Judy - do you think that be of interest to him or is he at the market all day? Wouldn't want to interfere with his livelihood...but if he's close enough and wanted to break for lunch or something....

Sounds very interesting!!!! Said in the voice of the guy that said that on Laugh In years ago. Didn't he hide behind a bush also?