Ever since I first stepped into our kitchen, with its rough-hewn wooden beams studded with square hand-forged nails, I’ve had an image in my mind of adorning it with braided strands of fragrant garlic. Today, that cozy fantasy became reality.
This garlic is a softneck variety called Nootka Rose. I chose to grow both softneck and hardneck garlic, and while the hardneck garlic won’t be ready for another few weeks, the Nootka Rose was ready to be harvested about two weeks ago. In my growing zone (US 6a), it’s generally recommended to plant garlic cloves in mid-October. Last year, though, I was in the throes of awaiting nasal surgery, and planting my garlic just wasn’t high on the list of priorities until that was over, so I didn’t end up planting my garlic until mid-December. I might have had bigger heads of garlic if I’d planted earlier, but I’m still very pleased with my harvest. I pulled up the Nootka Rose on a particularly scorching June day, eager to get them out of the ground before another storm came. Bursting into the house with an overflowing armful of garlic, and seeing John’s delight at this abundance we’d grown ourselves, is a memory I’ll hold dear.
I cured the garlic in our mudroom, where we have a dehumidifier running. It was so satisfying to see the outer layers turning to a translucent, papery covering over the tender cloves. And the scent! Walking into the mudroom became an exquisite olfactory pleasure— spicy, rich, a little sharp, with the underlying earthiness of the dirt still clinging to the roots of each head.
My final count was fifty full-sized heads split into three braids, plus a braid of a dozen or so smaller heads whose stems had been bent in heavy rain. I picked these smaller ones early to prevent them from rotting in the ground as they no longer could receive nutrients. They won’t store as long as the others, so I’ll be using them first in my kitchen. I can hardly wait to bake a loaf of crusty bread and tuck minced garlic and butter (Kerrygold— the good stuff) between the slices and bake it again for the most luscious garlic bread. I love knowing that I’ll be reaching for garlic from our garden well into the autumn and winter, a little package of summer sunshine on my shoulders and the deep, quenching nighttime storms cooling the hot earth.
What are you harvesting these days? If you have a favorite garlic-heavy recipe, I’d love to hear about that, too.
