Few things surpass working with ingredients that you have taken from seed to harvest yourself; other than cooking them with good kitchen tools, of course – the combination of the two resulting in an outrageously good time.
Garlic is an incredibly easy crop to farm, making it a perfect first rung on the ladder to growing at home, whether you have a container garden or a plot of land. Perhaps you’re at the beginning of the journey towards self-sufficiency, or you’re curious and have soil space to experiment with. Read on for essential tips on how to reap what you sow.
Before planting
You can grow garlic from a clove, and the process couldn’t be simpler. There are, however, a couple of considerations before you open throttle. Think first of the variety you want, the two most common being hardneck and softneck.
Hardneck garlic is (as the name suggests) the more robust of the two, suiting harsher and colder climates. Hardneck garlic also produces garlic scapes, which are flowering stems that appear in the early summer. You can pick them as or before they flower, and they have a mild garlicky flavour with subtle sweet and green notes. Chiffonade the scapes and use them as a garnish similar to chives – they’re also delicious pickled or fermented. As an additional tip: picking the scapes dissuades the plant from the distraction of producing beautiful white flowers, and it instead focuses its attention on creating the most voluptuous bulb possible.
Softneck garlic grows better in warmer, gentler climates and has a milder flavour. It typically produces more cloves per bulb and can store for much longer than its hardneck counterpart – this is why softneck garlic is more commonly found in supermarkets. If you’re growing garlic in the UK and want both, you could grow your hardneck variety outside and your softneck under a polytunnel or greenhouse. You can also grow garlic indoors, providing it is in a spot with plenty of sunlight (at least 6 hours per day).
When to plant garlic
Garlic planting should be carried out between mid-October and mid-December. Any earlier or later and you risk an under or overdeveloped crop, resulting in either crop failure or undersized bulbs. The plants will then take between eight and nine months to reach harvesting maturity.
How to plant garlic
You can grow garlic in pots and don’t have to sow directly into beds. Start by breaking up the bulbs into individual cloves and place them separately, with the pointed end facing upwards, roughly three inches into the soil and five inches apart. Planting garlic cloves in an offset diagonal pattern will maximise your space efficiency, allowing as many cloves as possible to grow in a single planting area.
The surrounding moisture in the soil will activate root growth, a process which starts as soon as the cloves are placed in the ground. UK gardeners, who tend to have moist soil and wet winters, will not likely have to water their garlic until the spring or summer. A good rule to follow as it gets warmer: if there’s a period of 10 days without any rain, give the crop a generous soak.
Harvesting garlic
When the lower half of the plant has turned brown, it’s ready to harvest (usually from late-June onwards). However, for the more impatient among our readers, harvesting can happen much earlier. ‘Green garlic’ is an immature garlic plant, pulled from the ground in the spring. The bulbs aren’t nearly as developed, and they bear closer resemblance to a calçot. However, green garlic is incredibly aromatic, with a mild flavour that pairs perfectly with fats. Mix it into an infused butter or whip up an oily green garlic pesto – making use of our Garlic Crusher, naturally.
If you have exercised saintly patience or have simply forgotten – nine months is a while and people are busy, after all – pull the garlic out of their beds and leave them to dry in the sun for a day or so before leaving them in a dry room, spread evenly across a flat surface. Or hang them in small bunches for up to six weeks to cure. Once ready, hardneck garlic will last up to six months and softneck can last up to a year in a cool, dry place.
Finally, you don’t have to dry out all of your crop. Bulbs pulled fresh from the ground are known as ‘wet garlic’, which has a slightly sweeter and more intense flavour. As it must be eaten fresh, we recommend that it is a yearly treat reserved specially (and quite rightly) for the hard working grower. Happy sowing.