Growing a baby and growing garlic take roughly the same amount of time.
I had the realization last night as I was roasting up the garlic that had taken nearly 9 months of tender care, waiting, and longing to grow. That is a much awaited bite of garlic bread.
Two nights ago, I realized it was time to harvest these puppies. After consulting YouTube and Google some gardening experts I learned that garlic is ready to harvest when the tips of the leaves brown and after the scapes have come up and been harvested (for hard neck garlic anyways).
Digging up the bulbs was harder than I thought. It took some real muscle. My son thought it was very exciting to play “farmer.” I don’t blame him. It’s not every day you get to dig up delicious eats out of your backyard like these.
Here I am with my boy, immediately after the garlic harvest. I like how this photo makes me look like I’m wearing a bizarre garlic masquerade mask.
Here is our garlic harvest!
These babies? HUGE! I didn’t plant elephant garlic, but they remind me of that variety.
Of course I had to enjoy some of this beautiful garlic right away. I found a very simple Roasted Garlic recipe on allrecipes.com. All you do is roast the garlic cloves with some olive oil for 40-60 minutes in a 400 degree oven. Viola. The smell was so delicious I thought I was going to pass out.
And finally…
It was time.
I would do it all over again. In a heartbeat.
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
I have never seen garlic seed packets in the big box stores. Where did you get the seeds or is it not grown from seed? Very nice too and I want to grow my own garlic next year,hope it grows in WI.
Val- you just divide up a head of garlic and plant the individual cloves. Even works with the ones from the grocery store
Tanya is correct! I actually ordered mine through a seed company – and they basically just sent me some garlic. DOH. VERY VERY simple. Sort of like planting bulb flowers in that you plant them in the fall and then they pop up in the spring.
If you put extra olive oil in while you are baking the garlic you can save it in the fridge for cooking with later. My husband is the cook in the family and he loves it when I make garlic olive oil for his cooking. You can even freeze the baked garlic in cubes and save for later in cooking. Mmmm, makes me want to bake garlic!
I totally saved what we didn’t eat! Thanks for your tips!
In the PNW when is a good time to plant the Garlic??
I’ve heard fall. I planted mine in mid-October, if I recall correctly? A fabulous site for ordering PNW seeds and tips is territorialseed.com
Save a few cloves to plant for next year’s crop.
WILL do! See, the frugality keeps on going!
Wow, looks delicious! Does garlic take a lot of room to grow in the garden?
These took up one bed & a half….so not terribly.
Those are gorgeous! I can’t figure mine out. I planted elephant garlic (I thought) and the bulbs are small and the cloves are not looking individual. I also got all this tiny baby pods. What do you do with those? Do I dry them out in a dark cool place before using? Did you?
My favorite recipe for garlic is put make a foil packet containing newly harvested potatoes (I grew some Austrian Crescent this year and they were superb and prolific!), cut into chunks, a few heads of garlic (my favorite is Bavarian from wegrowgarlic.com), a few chunked onions, fresh sprigs of rosemary, sea salt, freshly ground pepper, and lots of good olive oil. Seal the packet and cook on the BBQ for about 20 minutes total, rotating and turning every 5 minutes or so. I always cook these while the coals are burning down in preparation for the main course and then set them off to the side of the grill.
You cannot believe how good this is! The garlic is called just “Bavarian.” When it’s grilled and even slightly charred, it becomes sweet, if you can imagine garlic candy. I’ve charred other garlic and they become bitter but not Bavarian.
I would highly recommend getting some of the garlic from a grower rather than the store. You simply cannot believe the difference in the flavor in the different varieties. You will never go back to store bought again! If you are wanting to grow it for next year, order NOW from wegrowgarlic. They run out quickly.
The only affiliation with the company is that I sent them the stock for Bavarian after I found it in a farmer’s market. Normally you can keep growing your own after getting a start but I had to burn all mine after garlic rust destroyed my crop several years ago.
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