This garlic harvest is unique. It is the last garlic harvest from my old garden. Planting it was my first gardening effort during my recovery from a serious accident. My aunt dug the rows for me, and my mother helped me plant the cloves. Both of them told me I needed to be resting instead of planting garlic, but since I have helped them with crazy projects, they understood my need to get this garlic in the ground before it was too late. We got the garlic in the ground in late October or early November.
I ordered the original garlic from Peaceful Valley Farm Supply back in the fall of 2016. I grew out that garlic during the fall and winter of 2016-2017, and enjoyed an abundant harvest. As much as it pained me, I saved back the biggest, sturdiest, and healthiest bulbs for seed garlic, and we ate the rest. I even sold a few bulbs, and I gave some as gifts. I stored the bulbs in the cupboard and away from moisture and daylight.
During my recovery from my illness, I broke apart the bulbs into individual cloves. Then I soaked them in an aromatic mixture of fish emulsion and the cheapest vodka available. The fish emulsion gives them a boost of nutrients and the vodka kills bacteria and fungi. People use baking soda, rubbing alcohol, peroxide, and other things to achieve similar results. This blog post describes some other methods of soaking them.
I marked off the rows, about 8 inches apart and four inches deep, and after my aunt dug them I sprinkled rotten chicken litter in the rows. I put the cloves into the ground pointy side up, and covered them with soil. I did not mulch them, and I battled weeds all winter. I recommend mulching them with straw or leaves.
In June, as the leaves began to turn brown, I harvested the garlic. In my early garlic-growing years I have waited until the leaves turned entirely brown to harvest them, but by then the garlic bulb had begun to break apart. Hardneck garlic, which is what I plant because I find that it is easier to cook with the larger individual cloves of hardneck garlic than the smaller ones of softneck garlic. This is a short explanation of the difference between the two.
I also grew some elephant garlic. I got it in a sampler pack from Peaceful Valley. I don’t really like it because it’s not as pungent as ordinary garlic so I have to put more minced garlic in a dish to get the same flavor. I love it roasted on homemade bread, though. It has a much larger root system than ordinary garlic and so I will need a chisel, I think, to get the roots to let go of the clay.
To cure the garlic, I am giving it daily sunbathing time on dry days. It rests inside the shed at night and on rainy days. When the green leaves become brown and crunchy, I will remove them and store the garlic in my pantry for the winter.
