Deeebert, don't know where you live and shop, but if you can find 10 heads of fresh picked garlic for $3.00 I'd say that you were very lucky.

$3.00 a head is probably the average price for local garlic. Sometimes I get lucky and find smaller heads for $2.00 and larger heads for over $4.00.

FOAS. Regular garlic. I never buy elephant garlic. Actually I don't think I have ever seen Elephant garlic at any of our farmer's markets.

Moe did the calculation and we are looking at .50 cents a clove.

Here (NYC) in a Spanish store garlic is $ 0.99 for five heads, sometimes even cheaper. That is 15 times cheaper!

I would consider $3.00 a head a luxury food item, beyond the means of many people.

re: farmers market, don't assume produce sold are pesticide free and local:

"---At all nine outdoor markets, and during a handful of repeat visits, we found a sharp disconnect between the actual practices and the stated policies of adhering to the law. Farmers or their hired sellers often made misleading claims, implying that they had grown their produce organically or without sprays. Or, like Suncoast, they failed to display a certificate verifying that they grew the fruits, nuts and veggies themselves � and didn't buy them on the sly from packing houses or wholesalers.
Today, some of what the stalls sell is barely distinguishable from food sold by Vons, Ralphs, Costco, Gelson's, Target, Walmart or Albertsons. And some of the outgoing, eager hawkers � who shoppers tend to assume are real farmers � are actually just sellers hired to move goods.
Most of it is perfectly legal. California law places no restrictions on the size, or the "organic-ness," of the agricultural concerns that peddle herbs, vegetables, fruits, nuts and other edibles at farmers markets. And state-regulated chemical pesticides and fertilizers can legally be applied to the millions of pounds of non-organic produce sold at farmers markets each week. "

dcarch

Dcarch, our farmers' market sells only locally grown or produced food products. Unfortunately, the number of organic farmers is few and far between.

Here is a link that might be useful: Red Stick Farmers' Market

When you see garlic with green leaves, heirloom tomatoes that only keep two days, herbs with intact roots, etc., you can have a better idea whether the seller is a farmer. I always interview the seller, and since I grew up on a farm, I can have a good idea of whether the seller is honest. If the seller cannot or will not answer my questions, I buy from someone else. I look at the packaging also and see what kind of crates are being used, although this is only a minor clue. However, if I see something that looks like a large scale packing operation, I stay away from it at a farmers' market.

I think the garlic looks great, and I think you are especially lucky to get the leaves with the heads! I went to a farmers' market in Vancouver, and I was very impressed with it, especially because of the seafood.

Lars

Dcarch, I agree with you Ann's garlic is expensive but no more than what I'd expect to pay here for local grown. That's why we grow our own.

Our farmer's market is also only locally grown or produced products. It's not all organic. The quality of the produce does vary with some being below what you'd expect in Whole Foods but most is very good quality. But, for instance, there's not a really good baker currently selling at Denison. I'd like to be that person but we don't have a Cottage law in CT.

Ann, the garlic is pretty. Enjoy. Depending on variety prices here are also between $2/head & $5/head. Some are organic. Some are not.

/tricia

Here is a link that might be useful: Denison Farmer's Market

dcarch - You bring up a valid point that I've asked before: Who is to say that your local farmer is growing better, safer product than a mass producer who it would seem is under greater scrutiny? I used to make a point of shopping at my local farmer's farmstand until I realized how much they were "outsourcing."

According to my "main" supermarket's web site, their garlic comes from either USA, Argentina or Chile. I pay 50 cents a head. For the amount that I use, that's not going to break the bank. If I used a lot more for "health reasons" I'd certainly not be looking towards China for a cheaper source. I hope I'm reminded to plant my own garlic this fall.

FOAS,

Now is the time to be ordering your starter garlic. It will be easy to remember to plant it when it arrives in your mailbox in mid-Sept to early Oct. :) There's lots of fun varieties to try. Your climate is like mine - both hardneck & softneck do well here. Plant a few of several kinds. You won't need to do any extra gardening work except put the cloves in the ground & harvest next July. We get adequate natural rainfall - it basically grows itself here.

/tricia

I don't have any confidence in my ability to outsmart the professionals by interviewing them; instead, if I am intereseted in pesticide free stuff, I look for vendors who sell ugly looking produce,

When it comes to chemicals, local non-organic farmers may be the worst offenders.

Large scale farming is big business. Efficiency is everything. The exact type of pesticide is used and is precisely applied using computer driven electrostatic sprayers and GPS controlled equipment. Nothing like that is possible with local farmers. They tend to over apply all kinds of chemicals because they cannot afford not to.

I use huge quantities of garlic for black garlic making. I would have to win the Mega-million Lotto to be able to afford to buy local.

dcarch

I grew this garlic from 5 bulbs of about 6 cloves each(30?).
The reason that you find garlic dry is because it is cured to keeping longer. If you have a large flower pot & a porch then you can grow garlic too.
{{gwi:362832}}

The rules of the farmers markets around here state that all fresh produce has to be grown within a certain distance of the market. The venders make signs saying if it's organic or pesticide free.

I buy my garlic at the farm where it is grown. I've known this farmer for quite a few years. When I stopped on Saturday, he had just finished trimming and washing some he had just pulled. So...I bought some more. Some is an Italian variety and some is the 'Music' variety. I have been paying $6.00 a lb this year. I like buying it by the pound best because there is quite a difference in the size of heads.

I had cured one batch already that I had bought about 10 days ago. Here is Saturdays haul..... I may buy more.

Nancy

Everything sold at our local farmers markets is grown locally.

I'm familiar with the farmers I purchase from. I've been buying from many of them for over 10 years.

The garlic I purchased Sunday still needs to be cured. It is still attached to three foot long stalks.

Once the farmers start selling cured garlic it will still sell from $2.00 to $4.00 plus per head and if the per pound prices are the same as last year , anywhere from $12.00 to $14.00 a pound.

~Ann

Difference in location I guess, around here they've been selling .75 a head for garlic. Up from last year's .50 ea. Much nicer than what I can get at the grocery.

I paid $1 a head for Music and something labelled 'Polish' at the local farmers' mkt on Saturday. Wanted some more Music to plant so that I could eat some of the Music that I grew. These were good-sized heads, quite a bit lgr than average grocery store size, a bit smaller than the ones that I grew. The grower had larger heads of Music, what he said were $3-4 dollar size that he did not have displayed. He said that nobody wanted to pay that much for garlic.

In retrospect, I wish that I had bought a couple of the big heads of Music to save for planting.

Nancy, I weighed the Music heads that I bought...they average around 2 oz. each (@ $1 per head), or about $8 per lb. Depending on how much weight is lost with curing, it looks like you're getting a fair deal @$6 per lb.

I would consider $3.00 a head a luxury food item, beyond the means of many people.

I agree. In fact, I consider everything I buy at local farms/farmers markets a luxury food item.

Local farm/farmer market prices are so much more expensive than grocery store prices.

There is no comparison though between what is available in the grocery store and what is locally grown.

Price wise I can buy cheap California and Chinese garlic for about the same price as DC mentioned, and I do in the winter months. Big difference in price but also in quality.

Same goes for most other vegetables too. Fresh picked green beans, peas, etc.. are more expensive than what is sold in the grocery stores. Grocery store tomatoes vary around here from $1.89 to $2.89 a pound. Farm/Farmers Market tomatoes will sell from $3.50 to $4.50 a pound. And as much as I hate to pay that much, there really is no comparison.
So I splurge during the short season on my favourite fresh vegetables.

Nancy I weighed the garlic I bought and the heads average 5 oz. each. They still need to cure so they are about the same size as yours. $6.00 a pound would be an amazing great deal here.

Well said Ann, I totally agree. I made the decision years ago to buy the very best foods that I could find.

We don't eat out all that often and even when we do, I'm often very disappointed in the food. I'd rather cook at home where I know I'm eating good ingredients. I think many true "foodies" feel this way.

Ann, I meant to post above how wonderful your garlic looks. Enjoy! Enjoy!

Nancy

Wizardnm, you said that the farmer you talked to said
that he 'washed' his garlic? That is a no-no in the
garlic world.

lbpod,

I did some research on that issue last year because we'd had a lot of rain just before I wanted to harvest & the soil was very wet & clinging to the garlic. Seems there is a bit of controversy around the issue - some say a light washing especially if you have clay soil is okay & others feel washing of any sort shortens storage quality.

Not sure there is any one absolute answer. We do not have clay soil & decided not to wash - just let the soil dry off during the cure. But, maybe, Nancy's grower has clay soil &, therefore, lightly washes his harvest?

/tricia

It is my understanding, from talking to garlic growers, that it is okay to wash immediately after pulling from the ground. The garlic is damp from the earth anyway so a quick rinse will not hurt.

~Ann

We had 2" of rain the night before this garlic was pulled. He just did a light rinse to get the mud off. There was still some dirt clinging to the garlic. It will finish curing fine.

I find that good quality locally grown produce is either very expensive or free.....

Ann, in a perfect world the soil at garlic harvest time would not be wet/damp. It is recommended to stop watering one month before harvest. But, of course, Mother Nature did not get that memo. :)

/t

Love the garlic. I bought some huge heads a few weeks ago at my local farmer's market. I like using it when it's fresh and then curing some for later use.

I agree with the comments about farmer's markets. The prices are not necessarily lower than what you can purchase elsewhere. And sometimes the quality is not much better either. But when it's good, it's very, very good and worth the extra cost.

Here in Northern California, there are at least two distinct types of farmer's markets. One is just a regular market type arrangement where anyone can offer their wares or produce as long as they have met the minimum requirements. The other kind is a CERTIFIED farmer's market. At a certified market, all the produce must be grown locally and by the vender/farmer. They must meet much more stringent requirements. Many of the certified farmers also grow organic produce. I only shop at certified markets, and like others have mentioned, have become familiar with the farmers who serve El Dorado County. I know which grower has the biggest blackberries, the sweetest raspberries, the best summer squash, etc. Although there are at least two year-round markets in Sacramento, up here where I live, the farmer's markets only run from May to September. So I take advantage of the fresh produce while I can.

So I just got back from Wal-Mart ( yes I know!...but I needed a variety of stuff and this meant I didn't have to go to 3 different stores!)...passed the produce aisle and noticed a display of beautiful garlic 1 1/4 pounds per mesh bad....loudly labeled "Grown in the USA". I didn't buy any as I still have some left from last year.....but.....
Linda C

After work, just got back from Shoprite supermarket.

California garlic, $3.49 a lb. pretty big, about 5 heads a lb.

Question: What do you mean by "quality" garlic?

To me, there are hundreds of varieties of garlic, they may taste different, but one is not more quality than the other.

I have not seen rotten garlics sold, they all seem good quality to me.

dcarch

No Chinese biohazards?

dcarch,

By 'quality', I mean food that has not been grown in contaminated soil nor contaminated in the planting, harvesting, packaging, shipment, etc. An example of what happens when regulations are lax is the piece of land I've linked to below.

This EPA Super Fund Site, one of the first in the US to be placed on the National Priorities List, is where I grew up. Home Sweet Home. I wish I could post pictures of the house, still containing the chair I sat in to open my Christmas presents still visible in the living room, behind the barbed wire with the multiple skull & crossbones signs attached. But they are not digital. I swam in the pool, drank the water, took my baths from the well water, ate the grapes closest to the plant yard (only 26 acres of 2,000 were contaminated - oh, yippee), played with my Tonka trucks in the oily pressure treating yard by the stacks of freshly treated lumber so my sister, working in the office, could keep an eye on me, enjoyed thousands of fork-lift rides from workers entertaining a bored kid as they carried the lumber to be stacked, and on and on and on. I have been sick since I was nine. Coincidence? My two nieces who played right beside me have also been sick since childhood. Coincidence?

Today, I do not want my food to contain chromium, arsenic, PCPs, or any other contaminants. So, I don't buy Chinese garlic because I don't trust the Chinese government to regulate & oversee their regulations. I don't necessarily trust the US either but more than China.

End of my definition & reasons behind wanting 'quality'.

/tricia

Here is a link that might be useful: Short EPA Blurp Announcing a Savings to the American People

I would rather not eat root crops which may have been fertilized with "night soil"...

I would rather not eat root crops which may have been fertilized with "night soil"...

Interesting to know that punishment in China for food safety violations can be death panelty.

As what happened to the baby formular violators.

The US population must be very uneducated. Food imports from China jumped three folds in recent years.

dcarch

"The US population must be very uneducated."

Indeed. If I undestand it correctly, that's why you buy Chinese product, so that you can save your money to help fund education so that we can become smart enough to know not to buy Chinese product. Or something like that? My head's spinning!

Listen, we can argue till the Chinese cows come home over what's better, what's safer, etc. As you well know - and preach - there's more to the "food experience" than taste. Some people, like you, enjoy food more if it's cut up creatively and displayed in geometric patterns. Other people get satisfaction out of believing that their food is fresh and safe from nasties. Whatever floats your boat; it's all good.

Back to farmer's markets: Here my favorite small market sells only what the family that owns it grows, and it's closed in the winter. No corn from Texas or tomatoes from Mexico or garlic from China, it's all grown on one 40 acre patch about 10 miles from my house.

There are a couple of local farmer's markets who allow people to rent booths. They require that all products be produced locally and by the seller. So, if the sweet corn is too big and starchy or the tomatoes are over ripe or I find a bunch of bugs in the beets, I know that I can just call Tom or Julie or whoever and tell them and they'll make it right. Farmers stand behind their product because they'd like to keep regular customers.

As for the death penalty for food safety violations, it doesn't seem to have been much of a deterrent, given the volume of complaints I've heard.

I'll spend a bit more and buy good food and cut corners somewhere else, like satellite television subscriptions or cell phone contracts, etc.

Annie

I planted garlic last fall for the first time. It started sending up green shoots, not scapes, in January (before the early spring started). The heads were very small when I harvested it. My question is....could I have planted it too shallow? I ordered the garlic from Gardeners Supply along with some other things and don't remember the kind. Also what kind of garlic gives you scapes? Annie, would you plant Music again, and/or is there a specific variety you or anyone would recommend. I don't want to plant a ton.

jude

Here is the garlic I ordered from Gilroy. You can imagine what my office smells like now. It is quite a hefty package, but I don't have a scale in here. This should last me another year.

Lars

All the posts on garlic got me all worked up about growing garlic. The number of varieties (over 300) was a big surprise. Briefly, I have about 4lbs of garlic arriving over the next month. DH is already panicking over the prospect of backbreaking work planting hundreds of cloves. We will smell to high heaven next year, I hope.

Cheryl

Lars, did you choose a variety for the braid? Looks good. :)

/tricia

Tricia, I just ordered whatever what standard. I still have some left over from last year, but not a whole lot.

Cheryl, four pounds would last me a year! I think that is about what my braid weighs. Is it planting season now? I do not think that I want to dedicate any of my yard to growing garlic, as it is already getting crowded (except for the lawn part), and I would rather grow something more difficult to find, like lemongrass. I have two pots of lemongrass right now, and I am thinking about putting one of them into the ground.

Lars

Lars, I know four pounds is probably more garlic than we need, but I got a little carried away.... A friend suggested we might have a farmer's market stall next year.

We live on an acre so there's a fair bit of space to plant. Most of it is wild - cactus, sagebrush and the like - but part of it is cultivated. The garlic varieties I chose aren't sold in any commercial markets I've seen, so this is my justification. See the link for descriptions.

Cheryl

Here is a link that might be useful: Gourmet Garlic website

Jude, I'd definitely plant "Music" again, it has a nice flavor and grows noticeably bigger than other varieties. It's the stuff that got Bud his blue ribbon at the fair:

You can see the difference between my "Music" and red variety I grew:

Annie

Annie,I remembered you saying that Bud won a ribbon on Music so I thought perhaps you were pleased with it. I may order some of it to plant. Your red garlic is, I'm sure, larger than what I grew. Any advise on planting???? Depth, for instance, and I think I planted in Sept. last year.

jude

Jude, I just till the plot well and stick the cloves into the ground however far they go in. I just push them in with my index finger, so maybe an inch. I think none of them were probably the same, LOL.

I planted mine the end of October, right around Halloween, September is way too early here. So, I plant in late October or early November and harvest in July. Other than that I don't do anything else except keep the weeds down and water it regularly if we don't get rain (like this year). My garden gets a good dose of cow manure every year, but other than that I don't fertilize it either.

The red garlic is about the diameter of a quarter, I was disappointed. The "Music", though, grew like gangbusters, I'll definitely keep some and plant it this fall.

Oh, and don't forget to trim the scapes, or you'll get small bulbs...

Annie

At we grow garlic .com, they say to eat the small cloves & plant the large ones. Large cloves= large bulbs, mulching & weeding, watering helps a lot too. You should not plant cloves deeper then 1 inch.

Here is a link that might be useful: Allium forum

Like Cheryl, all this talk convinced me to buy some seed garlic. I planted some a few years ago and was impressed, but for some reason did not continue planting it in my vegetable garden for the next few years.

Yesterday I placed my order with Garlic Stone Farm - some hardneck and some softneck. I went with some hardneck because I wanted some of the most pungent garlic I could find and hardneck seems to have more selection in that area. And I got some softneck because it lasts longer in storage.

By the way, many varieties were already sold out in lots of online stores. I wasn't able to get my first choice. I ended up getting Italian Loiacono and German Porcelain.

As to the 'scapes' of hardneck garlic. I let a couple
of my scapes mature. In the head of the scape are lots
of tiny bulbs, as Annie aluded to. At the end of the
season, after I cleaned and tilled the garden, I set
aside a small area and sprinkled these small bulbs from
the scapes. In the spring, that area looked like it
was growing grass. It was those small bulbs growing.
I harvested them like I would chives, and they were
wonderful in whatever I put them in. I'm just sayin...

Geeez, I think my experimental garlic forest might be worth a fortune. I grew Music for the first time this year..the plants look great.

Jude, you may have softneck garlic...it doesn't make scapes. I poke my cloves in pretty deep, 3" or so and 5-6" apart, but we have long winters with bad freezes some years. We plant in mid-late Oct. and we're just getting scapes. As for small bulbs, I know garlic doesn't like competition from weeds. And sometimes it's just a carpy year and it's all small.

Lunch was pita bread with a garlic scape and cannellini bean hummus-ey dip...mmmm....

Thank you all so much. I think I may have actually learned something and that's good. So I guess I'll plant around October.Can't wait to see what next year's crop is like. Storage...something I need to know. Can't store it in my potting shed 'cause there's no heat. One thing I need to ask. Should I have clipped the green shoots when they started appearing in late winter. I didn't and they finally turned yellow and fell over late May or early June.

jude

Jude, I usually harvest garlic when about 2/3 of the leaves have turned yellow/brown and died. I check when they are about half gone, if you leave the heads of garlic too long they'll "explode", so I keep an eye on them when they start dying off.

Storage? I hang them in my garage to cure, trim the tops and put them in the basement. My basement isn't very cold, it's about the same temperature as my house, about 55F all winter. The garlic stores well there anyway, and I can keep fingerling potatoes from the fall harvest and they are still good to plant in May, although they are very well sprouted by then.

Katiec, that's a heck of a garlic plantation you've got going there!

Annie

I'm no expert in growing garlic, but from my experience,
DON'T leave them in the soil too long. I've done that
before, and the results are a black coating that I
think is the beginning of rot. Especially if the end
of your summer is wet, then get them out of the soil.
If in doubt, I advise harvesting early, as opposed to late.

Trimmed & cleaned up our cured garlic this morning. We got a nice sized harvest for the two of us. Plenty to share, trade, & last until next year.

Excuse the hazy picture, the weather's weird today - lots of humidity & haze with the sun trying to break thru makes for some glare.

{{gwi:1530079}}

/tricia

I buy German garlic, not from Germany, but from a local farm who grows both red German and white German varieties. The bulb is average size but the cloves are about double the size of most garlic, only about 6 or 7 in a bulb.

I get a basket of about 40 bulbs for $30 and it lasts a long while because it stays OK in storage and I don't use a huge amount of it, except when I make roasted garlic soup.