No... I am not Italian..but I do love to use fresh garlic in the kitchen.
Last year my fellow gardeners told me that garlic was really easy to grow.
So... I looked up some information and talked to friends and decided
to try some Italian soft neck garlic because I wanted the kind that you could use
to braid...you know those pictures of big bunches of braided garlic
hanging in Italian kitchens. Well...I wanted that.
So I ordered some heirloom bulbs last September and planted them in the potato patch..
after I cleared off the mulch and dug my potatoes.
I don't remember how much I ordered, but there were several bulb clusters and I separated them into individual cloves for planting. I ended up with about 24 I think. After planting them in one row about 12 in apart, and several inches deep...kind of like onion sets, I sprinkled some fertilizer around and covered the whole bed up with straw mulch about a foot deep.
And...then didn't do a thing until I dug them up this summer...sometime
in July I think..the tops had started to die back.
Above you can see a close up shot of what I had left..after digging, drying, and using in the kitchen all summer long. Each clove yielded about a dozen more!!
How easy is that?
Now it is time to start a tradition..and plant them again. It is October..you know.
I picked out the largest three..you can see them here
They don't look so impressive in the picture...but they were all nice sized cloves.
I separated them and then decided I should plant some more .
Koko agreed.
After choosing some more bulbs...I ended up with about 112 cloves.
Will we have garlic next year? I certainly hope so...I really do want to try braiding some.
I planted them in the tomato patch..it was time to tear it up...see below.
Don't you agree?
Your garlic turned out wonderful. I have never grown it because I am not a spice person to my families dismay.They like spicy foods and garlic in meals.
ReplyDeleteI have been in your area a time or two. I love it up your way and we usually get up that way once a year but not this year for some reason. Everyone was too busy this summer. I love to go look at all of the shops in and around Berlin and I always have to eat a Walnut Creek at the Amish restaurant. I would drive that far just to eat their baked chicken and go to the bakery. LOL! The Sauerkraut Festival was fun but so many people you could hardly move but then we were in no hurry and that was a good thing. LOL!