It' a super time to plant a super food - Lifestyle - New Jersey Herald

‘Tis the season to plant bulbs—not just tulips and daffodils—it’s time to get garlic in the garden, too.

Garlic has been considered a “super food” long before marketing masterminds coined the phrase in the early 1900s. Louis Pasteur, the father of the pasteurization process and penicillin, understood garlic to be a potent antibiotic. Chinese medicine has included the use of the strong-tasting bulb for centuries. Hippocrates used garlic to treat stomach disorders, infections and other ailments. It is an ancient food that was also touted by the Greeks and Romans to boost stamina and endurance. Indeed, medical research has added to the ancient wisdom and declared garlic can lower “bad” cholesterol, regulate blood pressure, and aide in the treatment of diabetes. And, just to illustrate how human preferences can change over the centuries, the Talmud sanctioned it as an aphrodisiac.

Very easy to grow, every garden— even if you only have flowerbeds — has room for garlic. It pays to grow your own, because unlike so many other members of the onion family, it is very difficult to find good, fresh garlic bulbs in local supermarkets. In fact, the only place I consistently purchase garlic is from our local farm markets.

OK, so it is good for us and cultures around the globe include it in their daily cooking. Even so, many of us recoil from the very strong bite of mature, raw cloves. The fact is, chopping garlic actually intensifies the strong flavor. Mincing it fine will intensify it further. Pulverizing it with salt makes it stronger yet. Trust Cooks Illustrated folks to explain why and come up with a way to modify garlic’s bite before we add it to recipes:

” We tested four methods: blanching whole cloves in milk for five minutes, blanching them in water for five minutes, microwaving the cloves until warmed through, and toasting them in their skins in a dry skillet until lightly browned.

“Both forms of blanching worked equally well, as did microwaving.

“Toasting was the least effective in mellowing out garlic’s taste. Here’s why: Garlic’s sharpness is caused by a sulfur-containing molecule called allicin. Allicin is produced through an enzymatic reaction by the enzyme alliinase, only after the cell walls of the garlic are damaged during cutting or chopping. To deactivate alliinase, you must raise the clove’s temperature to 140 degrees or above — which both microwaving and blanching accomplished (the type of liquid used is irrelevant). With light toasting, only the outer layers of the cloves got sufficiently hot to turn alliinase inert.

For simplicity’s sake, we prefer heating garlic cloves in the microwave to blanching them. Microwave the cloves in a small bowl for two to three minutes, or until warm to the touch but not cooked.”

Another way to obtain a subtle garlic flavor and exclude the bite is to blanch a clove in olive or other cooking oil and discard the clove before using the now-flavored oil. Place the oil you need in a small, heavy-bottomed pan over low heat. Smash a clove just once to crack it and peel away the paper skin. Add it to the oil. Watch the garlic closely — don’t walk away from the stove. As the oil warms you will soon see small bubbles rising from the garlic — remove the pan from the heat and let stand for five minutes or so. Discard the garlic and then cook vegetables, toast cubes of bread, or liven up boneless, skinless chicken breasts in your gently flavored oil.

To plant garlic, make sure you separate the large, papery head into individual cloves — don’t plant the whole garlic head in one hole. Poke a small hole into fertile garden soil and bury each individual clove, pointed end up, no more than two-three inches deep and six inches apart. Just like daffodils and tulips, each garlic clove is a self- contained “package” with all the food it needs to grow into another full head of garlic. Late next spring, green leaves (like the tops of green onions) will appear and grow on through June and July to around 24 inches tall.

In mid-summer, when bulbous flower buds begin to form at the top of these greens, remove the entire flower stalk. These stalks, called scapes, can be chopped up and used in cooking. They provide a fresh, mild garlic flavor, either raw or cooked.

When a third of the clump of greens turns yellow and brown, the garlic has reached its maximum size and is ready to harvest.

Vicki Johnson is a gardening columnist for the New Jersey Herald. She can be reached at vjgarden@gmail.com or athomeinsussexcounty.com.