Garlic Grounds

Start by planting organic cloves, and you'll have a garden full of this seasoning by spring
By CATHY FRISINGER
Special to the Star-Telegram

One of the rewards of backyard veggie gardening is that you get to have a better understanding of how the food in your neighborhood grocery store relates to you.

It was a sad understanding I gained recently of garlic. We grow onions most summers, but it had been many years since we'd thought about growing garlic in our back yard. The last time we contemplated it, the would-be grower simply purchased a garlic bulb at the grocery store, broke it into cloves and planted the cloves. It doesn't work like that these days, says bulb supplier Bob Anderson of Gourmet Garlic Gardens, west of Brownwood. It used to be that most of the garlic in grocery stores came from Gilroy, Calif., but today most of it comes from China, and the garlic grown in China is treated with radiation to inhibit sprouting and extend the shelflife, Anderson says. Sprout is, of course, exactly what you want it to do when you plant it.

Star-Telegram.com | 10/06/2007 | Garlic grounds