Home Grown Garlic

These small but flavorful bulbs are the result of my first attempt to grow garlic. These are close to the same family as onions, shallots, leek and chives, it has a long culinary history as well as medicinal. The papery skin covered bulb contains smaller individual cloves which need to be peeled as well before use. Garlic can be strong and pungent but will mellow and sweeten when cooked, The green stalks on the plants are edible and tender when young. I think garlic just might be one of the most common flavoring ingredient in cooking next to salt and pepper, I seem to use it in everything. The worlds biggest producer of garlic is China with about 77% of the output, the United States comes in 6th on the list with Gilroy California as the primary U.S. growing region. Now that my growing experiment is a success , I will have to plant more soon.