Green Garlic

Green garlic is garlic that’s been harvested ahead of the full time it takes it to grow. It’s a garlic with tender leafs that’s harvested early in the season before the bulb is created. The best way to think about it as a baby garlic.

It’s less spicy and more mellow giving it more ways in which it can be used. It’s a common plant often used and grown around the US and in Texas in particular.

Green Garlic Trivia

• Alliumphobia is a fear of garlics
• Cats shouldn’t eat it.
• They are not the same as garlic scapes

Green Garlic Buying Guide

The best way to make sure green garlic is fresh is to take a sniff. It shouldn’t smell as strong as onion does since it’s a young onion and that means it’s too mature to be used. The leafs should be flat rather than tubular.

Make sure that the bunches have a long white and purple base, and a dark green leafs with an intact root. There shouldn’t be any bruising and wilting. The leafs should look fresh and that’s easy enough to spot.

Green Garlic Production & Farming in Texas

The production process for a young garlic is the same as it would be for a garlic when it’s mature with the only difference being that it’s harvested sooner because you want it to be young and not to form a bulb. It’s therefore mostly available from February through May so that it’s planted on time.

Early Louisiana and White Mexican, are the most common variety of garlic planted for commercial production in the country. It can produce as much as 3.5 tons per acre when it’s fully grown meaning that it would be less than that when growing green garlic.

It can be grown in different types of soil and that’s why it’s such a popular and widespread vegetable that’s grown in many ordinary home gardens. It can also be grown with and without tillage if you have reservations towards tilling your soil.

The distance of planting varies from 15 centimeters (cm) x 15 cm to 20 cm x 10 cm to 25 cm. Mulch can be applied both before and after planting depending on the quality and moisture in the soil overall. There are some fertilizers that you should use and they depend on the overall quality of soil.

Pesticides

Not many pesticides are used on garlic because it has ways of naturally defending itself, and that’s why it’s spicy. It’s still best to buy organic and avoid all chances of getting a vegetable filled with pesticides.

Geography

Garlic originates in Central Asia and there’s as least a few thousands year of history of its consumption. It was known in ancient Egypt and there it was used as both food and a herbal medicine. In ancient Rome it’s been said that it’s a popular food “amongst the poor”.

Green garlic is rather popular in Europe and it was so for decades but not that much in the US. It was recently popularized by chefs, high end restaurants and the increased interest in healthy and organic food.

Packaging

For the most part there’s no need for packing at all when it comes to green garlic but it’s mostly wrapped in individual plastic containers that are then packed in larger cardboard boxes and shipped to their destination at the stores.

In some stores the garlics are kept fresh by springing some water on them from time to time. This will mostly help with keeping the green leafs look fresh for a longer period of time.

Enjoying Green Garlic

All of the plant is edible even though the immature bulb is the part that’s used in most recipes. You should remove it from the leafs and the stem with a sharp knife. There’s no need to peel the young and tender bulb at all before chopping.

It’s most often used in salads and that’s where it’s best mixed with vegetables that will neutralized its spicy taste and feel. Potatoes are the most common choice and they are also mushy and thus a contrast to crunchy green garlics.

Storage

It’s easy to store green garlic for 5-7 days. That’s how long it can be in a refrigerator if you put it into colder parts of it and if you keep it wrapped in paper and held in a paper bag.

Cooking

There are plenty of ways to cook using green garlic since it’s such a versatile and fun vegetable to add to many dishes. It’s mostly a part of salads, but it can be added to anything you fry and stir in a pan. It can be added to any recipe that contains onions, scallions or leeks. It will have the same affect with a milder and nutty flavor instead.

They can also be a good topic to many pastries, and pastas because they are crunchy and add a punchy taste to the dish.

Nutrition

Manganese: 2% of the Daily Value (DV) Vitamin B6: 2% of the DV Vitamin C: 1% of the DV Selenium: 1% of the DV Fiber: 0.06 grams Decent amounts of calcium, copper, potassium, phosphorus, iron and vitamin B1 This comes with 4.5 calories, 0.2 grams of protein and 1 gram of carbs.  Garlic also contains trace amounts of various other nutrients. In fact, it contains a little bit of almost everything you need.

One large, 12-week study found that a daily garlic supplement reduced the number of colds by 63% compared to a placebo. The average length of cold symptoms was also reduced by 70%, from 5 days in the placebo group to just 1.5 days in the garlic group.  Another study found that a high dose of aged garlic extract (2.56 grams per day) reduced the number of days sick with cold or flu by 61%. However, one review concluded that the evidence is insufficient and more research is needed. Despite the lack of strong evidence, adding garlic to your diet may be worth trying if you often get colds.

Cardiovascular diseases like heart attacks and strokes are the world’s biggest killers.  High blood pressure, or hypertension, is one of the most important drivers of these diseases.  Human studies have found garlic supplements to have a significant impact on reducing blood pressure in people with high blood pressure.

When Are Green Garlic in Season in Texas?