We learn something new every day…
Last year we planted garlic for the first time. We grew it outdoors in an old concrete laundry tub, and were only able to produce small one-inch bulbs with tiny cloves.
This year, thanks to a tip from Gardening Australia, we stored the cloves in the fridge for a month before planting. In addition, we fed the plants with blood and bone, and this time most of them grew much larger…
Here’s one bulb, broken up and peeled. Just three huge cloves…
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We’ve been short on time lately for preserving, so instead of making our usual passata, we’ve been slow roasting tomatoes in the oven instead.
We drizzle halved Roma tomatoes with oil and a scattering of salt, then pop them into a low oven for a couple of hours, until they just start to burn at the edges. Halfway through the cooking time, we squish them with a potato masher to flatten them out.
These store beautifully in the fridge for about a week, but also freeze really well in ziplock bags, ready to be taken out and added to the pot whenever a concentrated burst of roasted tomato flavour is needed.
They also make a wonderful addition to dishes like Pete’s vegetarian paella…
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We’ve discovered that sometimes weeds help with pest control, like this one which seems to have attracted all the aphids in the patch, leaving the mint and garlic bug-free…
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Finally, we’ll never throw out a sprouting onion again! We planted an old Italian sweet onion in the hopes of collecting seed, but had to move the chook dome before the plant had time to flower. So we pulled it out and found it had grown into quite a lot of edible onion…
So now, whenever an onion starts to sprout, we plant it in the garden and ignore it. If we need spring onions, I go out and break off some green shoots, and when it’s time to move the chickens again, we pull out whatever is there and use it in a stir fry!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
I often do the same with onion. It’s a very nifty trick. Garlic is something we’ve always struggled to grow well, and yes, we’ve even added bone meal. Our soil is heavy clay, and I think garlic likes things a bit more free-draining on their feet.
And I just watched your flatbread video from a few years ago. I just had an interesting experience with zepplin-shaped focaccia. Joanna suggested I see just how hydrated your dough was in the video – I think I know where at all went wrong now. Might try again next week.
Misk, we haven’t made flatbread in a while – Joanna’s post has inspired me to make some more! We grow our garlic in a big laundry tub in potting mix – it seems to do better in there than it does in the ground (maybe because it has less competition from weeds?).
could that aphid plant be butterfly weed? Does it flower?
I’m not sure what it is, Frances, but it has small yellow flowers. It grows all over our garden, and the chooks enjoy eating it! :)
A tip I learned years ago was that aphids love nasturtiums more than anything. Scatter a few seeds in between your other plants and all the aphids will move over. Lovely onions!
Cin, that’s interesting, as we have a sea of nasturtiums, and the aphids don’t seem to fancy them very much. I wonder if there are regional differences in what they like to eat?
Glad you’ve had better success with your garlic this year. We’ve just planted ours for next year. Your tomatoes look so good, I’d love a bag of those in the freezer. I did actually get around to making passata a la Pam Corbin this year, but our tomatoes weren’t up to much and it was very watery.
Choc, we only ever get a tiny crop, as we grow them in an old laundry tub, so we only ever plant out about 30 cloves each year. It’s so nice to have homegrown garlic, and we then top up with the garlic grown by our friends Ian and Di, so there’s always plenty around! The tomatoes have been great – I tried the same thing with eggplant slices as well, and I now have a stash of them in the freezer for a future moussaka!
a great crop there! I love growing garlic, so tasty. I add the ash from our wood burner onto the garlic bed in Spring, the garlic seem to like it!
That’s a great tip, thank you! :)
I’m growing garlic for the -first time- in tubs of fresh compost I’ve added organic chicken pellets. I planted the cloves about 2 week ago and I can see some have sprouted showing about 3 cm of sprout. Its Autumn here in the UK and the packet said plant this variety -French Thermidrome- in Autumn in a sunny place. I won’t feel so bad now if they don’t do as well as I was expecting. Thanks for the warning Celia.
Marilyn, I think your garlic will be fine – it seems to do well in colder climates. The refrigerating is really to help it along when it’s being grown in more temperate areas like where we are! Good luck with them! :)
Gorgeous. Always enjoy reading about your garden. My Polish grandmother ate raw garlic everyday.
I wish I could do that, Sally! I think I’d lose all my friends though.. :)
Ah, this is wonderful timing. My Peter has been asking about growing garlic for a while, but we’ve been too busy to investigate! Thank you for sharing.
Lizzy, we’re pretty chuffed with how well they’ve grown, but as I said, it’s only a tiny crop. I hope you give them a go though, they’re great fun! They should grow well in Canberra, because of the colder weather!
I love seeing all you are growing in your garden. Those garlic cloves are absolutely perfect – seeing I can’t grow them, I wish I could buy them in the shops like that.
Charlie, we’ve been seeing them at the markets a bit lately, although they’re still very expensive! They should come down soon, the season’s only just starting here.
Amazing garlic! I’ll have to feed mine more to get better results. Those tomatoes look amazing- little flavour bombs I bet. But what weed can I plant to attract my dog away from my tomatoes and berries? Give the the bugs over him any day :-)
A dog that eats your berries and tomatoes? That is hard – every time Bob the dog visits, he eats all our strawberries. :)
The tomatoes are just so great – and it’s much easier not having to drag the food mill out and make a big mess. :)
your garlic is huge, i am just about to plant mine, i had better get cracking, no need for a fridge out here though! Loving seeing your garden.. c
Thanks C! I’m looking forward to seeing all your garlic!
We have tried to grow garlic a few times but now have surrended to the local wildlife aka the brush turkey! He decided garlic would be much better on his mound!
Now I buy my garlic online which is fabulous, it lasts until the following April. It should be ready any day, I can’t wait. Nothing beats fresh garlic.
Christine, we buy most of our garlic from friends who grow it on a larger scale, and then we break up the cloves and freeze them. That way we don’t have to buy imported garlic all year long! :)
Here’s the post about our visit last year:
https://figjamandlimecordial.com/2011/01/06/a-day-at-ian-and-dianas-garlic-farm/
and also the bit I wrote about freezing garlic:
https://figjamandlimecordial.com/2011/01/08/frozen-garlic/
Great tips! I especially will use the tomato roasting idea, that’s great.
Thanks Sue! :)
my garlic won’t be ready to fully harvest until january but this year i planted the bulbs quite close together because i had so many and i’ve been using the thinned out plants in cooking..this has meant that i’ve had my own garlic for a lot longer than last year..it’s worked so well that i’m going to plant even more next year..
Jane, I’m so glad to know that worked! I always thought garlic needed space between it, but what a great idea to use all the thinnings for cooking!
I made my tomatoes into a roasted mash exactly like that! I have some in the freezer, but we ate a LOT of ours before I had the chance to freeze them!
Lovely garlic and tomatoes!
Heidi, they’re soooo moreish, aren’t they? We kept some in the fridge and have been putting them into everything – bread dough, sandwiches, risottos etc! :)
Your garlic is doing well! Fantastic stuff. Glad you have had more success with it. We think a lot depends on weather conditions, soil type and giving them a fair bit of space. We planted some in pots which were tiny, the ones in the big raised bed did much better. We tried some different varieties this year, but still get the best result with the early ones. I think we aren’t growing any this coming year to give the bed a break. Looking forward to seeing your summer garden growing xx :D
Joanna, we had the reverse – the few we planted in the beds were overwhelmed by all the other plants growing over the top of them, and are quite tiny! Maybe we need to figure it out and then allocate an entire bed to them! :)
OK. I’ll give that a try. Got nothing back from about 15 cloves this year.
Lee, I know this is probably a silly question to ask you of all people, but are you using local garlic as your seed stock? Apparently the imported stuff has all been sprayed with methyl bromide to stop it sprouting…
No, it was three different garlic types that i had bought from Diggers, the heritage seed folk. All sprouted but failed to thrive and had no production. It was a different bed to the one I used successfully last year, rotation being the ‘go’ but perhaps it was not nutrient friendly for the garlic. Next year…
BTW: Methyl bromide is a fumigant – used to ensure incoming plants are free of unwanted insects and rodents. Probably snakes and lizards too. It should have no affect on germination. I would say categorically that it wont but there is also no reason why it should.
Thanks for the clarification, Lee! I have to say, I haven’t had the best of luck with Diggers seeds – almost none of the ones we’ve tried have grown successfully…
Lovely looking garlic Celia. There is nothing, nothing, nothing better than fresh garlic. When ever I cut into some I have to keep stopping and smelling my finger tips just a little. Ahhh :-)
Tomatoes look good too. Some toasted sourdough, some garlic rubbed over it, slap on a tomato and a drizzle of awesome olive oil… Yum.
Brydie, they smell completely amazing – we’re letting the bigger bulbs dry and eating the little ones first, and they’ve been fantastic. And that’s exactly how we’ve been eating the tomatoes this weekend! :)
Thanks for the tip about the potato masher halfway through roasting the tomatoes!
My dh Tony plants sprouting [shop] potatoes as well as onions. You would not believe how good these taste! They take less space than you would think but you do have to mound the soil up a bit.
Rose, we’ve got potatoes growing in hessian bags this year – thanks for the reminder though, as they need to be hilled up! :)
Those are beautiful profits of your gardening skills! Thanks for those useful tips too! :) Your roasted tomatoes are looking divine & that vegetarian paella looks the best! Yummie,…:)
Sophie, the paella was delish – it’s based on an Ottolenghi recipe here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/apr/12/foodanddrink.recipe
Amazing garlic! I once had an incredible garlic soup in London at a restaurant run by a great chef Alistair Little. I wonder if I can find the recipe anywhere…btw – writing this on my new mac!!! I love it and can now blog again!!!!!
That’s great news, I’ve been missing your blog! :)
Hi Celia…what good tips…now I don’t think I’ll throw out a sprouting onion again either! Those tomatoes look delicious…Dzintra
Dzintra, it was a great discovery! We never did get any seed out of them, but the onions were delicious! :)
I cannot cook without garlic. Those cloves look buttery good. What’s in the paella?
Maz
Maz, the paella had wrinkly dried olives, oven roasted tomatoes, beans, peas, capsicums and the stock was a tomato water from our last batch of passata. It was inspired by the Ottolenghi recipe here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/apr/12/foodanddrink.recipe
Oooh, sounds intriguing! I’ve downloaded a couple of his recipes to try this week…. roasted sweet potatoes and a shallot, potato and goat cheese tatin.
Maz.
There’s always something new to learn, isn’t there! That weed is amazing, I can’t get over the aphids clustered on it!
Your garlic is looking really good, too…lucky thing to have fresh garlic already, mmm.
Chris, there’s not an aphid on the surrounding plants! I couldn’t get over it, but Pete said sometimes the odd weed will do that! The garlic was really early this year, I didn’t think we were supposed to pull it out until early December, but we had so much rain that I didn’t want it to rot!
Lovely garlic, Celia – I’ll bet you’re very chuffed with it. I love the onion idea, too. I have several daggy sprouting ones in the box in the pantry that I’ll put in tomorrow. Thanks for the tip.
Amanda, it’s nice not having to throw the onions out. And you can then completely ignore it in the garden, because it was going to be compost anyway, so anything that grows from it is a big bonus, if that makes sense.. :)
I bet those tomatoes are delicious! I haven’t had success with garlic. That’s a great tip about the aphids. They’re driving me nuts at the moment.
Claire, it would be good to be able to predict which weeds are going to be aphid magnets, but it seems to ad hoc, and it’s hard to leave every weed in the garden on the off-chance.. ;-)
Goodness me. You are so full of wonderful ideas Celia. For a minute then I thought you had a tray of roasted sweet potatoes. Your roma tomatoes looks amazing and terrific idea about adding to dishes for that extra concentrated tomato flavour. If ever you put together a book for publication, (hint, hint), this idea has to go in there!
Mariana, you’re very kind, thank you! :) The tomatoes have been great fun to play with too – we’ve kept some in the fridge and are eating them almost daily!
That garlic is very impressive looking – well done you! Must make you so happy to eat home made bread, rubbed with home grown garlic, topped with home grown tomatoes.
SG, we ended up with 20 decent sized bulbs – the rest were smaller, but still delicious!
You are clever, I wish I had time to grow stuff!
Tania, it’s still quite new to us, so we’re pretty excited! :)