Another task is done. Next year's garlic crop is now planted.
Fall is the ideal time to plant garlic. Doing it now allows the bulbs to establish good roots before winter, leading to larger and more flavorful cloves by the summer harvest. Every year, I plant two raised beds of garlic from Keene Garlic in Wisconsin. Garlic is great for cooking and very good for one's health. It is well known to lower blood pressure and cholesterol, and carries many antioxidant properties. Knowing that I also grow the garlic myself makes it even more special.
Here is my process, enjoy.
All the seed garlic that was prepared for planting the day before is brought out to my large half-acre vegetable garden.
A new top layer of soil is added to the bed before planting the garlic.
Once the soil is spread across the bed, Matthew rakes it, so it is level and smooth.
In an adjacent bed that has already been cultivated, Ryan uses a Bed Preparation Rake from Johnny’s Selected Seeds to create furrows in the soil. Hard plastic red tubes slide onto selected teeth of the rake to mark the rows.
Landscape string is secured at one end to ensure the rows are perfectly straight. This is a guide for all the other rows in the bed. Ryan already determined how many rows would fit in this bed and how many garlic cloves would be planted in each row.
Next, it’s important to feed the bed. Keene Garlic Fertilizer is an organic 5-2-2 formula specially made for garlic and alliums.
Using a scoop, Ryan broadcasts a generous amount of fertilizer over the beds.
This fertilizer will help produce large, robust bulbs that are flavorful and nutritious.
Ryan positions each clove. When planting multiple rows of garlic, be sure the rows are at least one-foot apart.
It is also important to give each clove enough room to grow and develop. They should be planted at least several inches from each other.
To make the holes for planting garlic, Phurba uses a dibble or a dibber. The T-grip on the dibber allows the planter to apply enough pressure to create a consistent depth for each hole.
Phurba pushes the dibber into the soil to make the hole.
Here is a seed garlic clove. It is planted with the pointed end faced up. The majority of garlic in the US is planted from mid-October through November before the ground freezes.
Phurba places the clove into the hole.
Cloves should be pushed down at least three inches deep.
Ryan and Phurba work in tandem – as one places the seed garlic in the row, the other plants it. If the soil in the bed is well cultivated, this should be a fast and easy process.
Phurba also makes sure to leave one row uncovered, so Ryan knows the proper placement of each clove.
Here is Ryan with the Elephant garlic. Elephant Garlic is actually a leek that resembles garlic in growing and in appearance. It has a very mild flavor.
All the garlic rows are marked with the appropriate variety name.
Phurba plants these cloves in the same way he did the others.
After planting, he backfills the rows with soil.
And then both beds are raked evenly. Any garlic crop will tolerate some shade but prefers full sun. This garlic will be ready to harvest mid-July to August. And that’s it – we wait until next year to harvest. If you’ve never grown your own garlic, give it a try.
Although garlic can be planted in the spring as soon as the ground can be worked, fall planting is recommended for most gardeners. This allows extra time for the bulbs to grow and become more flavorful for the summer harvest. Every year, I plant a big crop of garlic from Keene Garlic, a family owned farm in Madison, Wisconsin. Yesterday, my head gardener Ryan McCallister prepared the garlic for planting.
Here are some photos.
It’s always exciting to get a delivery from Keene Garlic filled with bags of fragrant garlic bulbs for my garden. I have been planting Keene Garlic for several years and am always so pleased with their growth and taste. Here’s my box containing several different varieties for planting this year.
Keene also sent a bag of Keene Garlic Fertilizer and Bioactive Liquid Biology Bundle to treat and feed the garlic before planting.
Here’s Blackie, my Greenhouse cat, inspecting the garlic that arrived. He’s the perfect feline helper on Halloween.
Remember the terminology – a head of garlic and a bulb of garlic refer to the entire structure that contains multiple individual segments.
And each of those segments is called a clove. A typical garlic bulb contains about 10 to 12 cloves, but this can vary depending on the size and variety. Some larger varieties may have only four cloves, while smaller bulbs can have up to 15 cloves.
Ryan works with one variety at a time to keep them organized. Each bulb is carefully broken to separate all the cloves. For the best results, plant the largest cloves from each bulb and save the smaller ones for eating.
Ryan is careful to keep each clove intact as he is separates. He also leaves some of the papery peel, called the skin, on the clove.
Some of the garlic I am planting this year include Amish Rocambole, a robust and very hardy type. It grows well in Northern States, and has large impressive bulbs with flavor that’s deep, full bodied, and medium hot.
The Romanian Red Porcelain garlic is best for medicinal purposes because it is high in allicin. It is known to be very hot with a tanginess that tends to linger.
The German Extra Hardy Porcelain garlic is large-sized and medium flavored. Because of its large root system, this hardneck is extremely hardy and often withstands freezing and thawing cycles when other garlic varieties don’t.
The Music Porcelain garlic is easy to grow. Raw, this garlic is very hot-flavored, but it mellows when it is baked or roasted.
Asian Tempest – Asiatic is very hot when eaten raw and sweet when baked. It tastes rich, garlicky, strong, and robust with easy to peel jumbo cloves.
Northern White is very strong, hot, and potent. It also has easy to peel jumbo cloves. It’s a great all-purpose garlic for mincing, baking, and grilling.
And, Elephant Garlic is actually a leek that resembles garlic in growing and in appearance. It has a very mild flavor. It is most commonly found in grocery stores. It is also larger than the other garlic varieties.
For the preparation process, Ryan uses the Bioactive Liquid Biology Bundle, which contains two easy-to-use concentrates that help produce larger, healthier bulbs and improve nutrient absorption.
While this can also be added to the planting soil, Ryan uses it as a pre-planting garlic soak.
First, he pours one tablespoon of each concentrate into a trug bucket of cold water.
The garlic is soaked one variety at a time, so as not to accidentally mix them up. This is Chesnok Red – Purple Stripe. The Chesnok Red garlic is an heirloom variety. It is loved for its rich flavor as an all-purpose cooking garlic. It’s also well known as a superb baking garlic.
The garlic is placed into the soaking solution. Ryan uses two buckets – one solid and one designed as a colander for draining. Soak the garlic for at least 30-minutes or up to overnight.
Then the garlic is thoroughly drained.
It is also rinsed several times with water and drained thoroughly again before drying.
Once all the garlic is put through the preparation process, the cloves are returned to their mesh bags. One bulb is left whole and kept with its variety bag in case needed.
Ryan continues to prep all the garlic for planting. It takes a while to get through all the bags, but it’s the perfect project for a very rainy day here at the farm. If you love garlic, try growing it yourself.
Here at my farm, I'm still enjoying some of the last harvests of the season.
Recently, I picked a good amount of black walnuts from under a large tree growing near my pond. Black walnuts are the wild walnuts native to North America and related to hickory nuts and butternuts. They have thicker, harder shells than the English walnuts traditionally found in stores, but they also have a richer, bolder, earthier flavor.
Here are some photos, enjoy.
Sitting on my servery counter just off my kitchen are glass containers filled with black walnuts. The wild American black walnut, Juglan nigra, is native to 32 states and is the official tree nut of Missouri. The flavorful nuts contain the highest protein of any other tree nut and are hand-harvested and used as a popular ingredient in both savory and sweet recipes.
Here is one of my black walnut trees, located near my pond and grove of weeping willows. In its natural setting, the black walnut tree can reach an average height of about 50 to 75 feet or taller. It favors areas between rivers, creeks, and denser woods and does best under full sun. The black walnut is known as an allelopathic tree – its roots, which may extend 50 feet or more from the trunk, exude a natural herbicide known as juglone which inhibits the growth of nearby plants. If you plant one, give it a lot of room.
Look closely, high up one can still see one of the black walnut fruits.
The bark of a black walnut tree is dark gray to black with deep furrows and a distinctive diamond-shaped pattern. The tree is also prized for its durable dark wood, often used for furniture and veneer.
Black walnuts have a yellow-green husk that turns dark brown as it ages.
During dormancy, the black walnut can be identified by looking at the nuts that have fallen around the tree. The area around my tree is filled with these flesh covered walnuts.
The husked nuts are about two inches in diameter. The nut inside is also more round, while the nuts on its butternut tree cousin are more egg-shaped and smaller.
The best time to harvest these black walnuts is from late September to October for most of the United States.
The husks are very soft at this stage and can be broken easily. Black walnuts also contain tannins, a juicy substance that stains clothing and skin.
Here, one can see the black walnut still encased in its husk, the husk broken, and the shelled nut exposed.
Once the husks are removed, the nuts are separated and the empty husks are thrown away – in the trash and not the compost pile because of the juglone chemical. It is important not to let that spread to other plantings.
What’s left are the walnuts in their hard shells – the hardest shells of all the tree nuts.
After all the nuts are picked, they are placed in cold water to remove any remaining black husk coating. Any nuts that float are discarded. This is a sign that the nutmeat did not form properly.
Here are two nuts that floated right to the top. The good black walnuts will sink.
To open black walnuts, place them on the ground pointed end up, and hit them with a hammer until they crack.
Once it is cracked, it is opened carefully as much of the nutmeat will likely be broken in small pieces.
Here is a nut still in its shell.
Because the black walnut shell is tougher than other nutshells, the nutmeat may be a bit challenging to remove. Another option is to soak the nuts for a couple of hours before opening – the shell will absorb water and soften, making them less likely to break apart inside.
Here is a bold and flavorful black walnut – the fruit of labor.
Black walnuts can be displayed on a fall counter, used for baking or cooking, stored in the fridge for up to a year, or for two or more years in the freezer. I love that all of these black walnuts were grown right here at my farm. And the pretty mums behind them too!
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