When it comes to garlic, sure, cloves are the main attraction. However, they aren’t the only edible part of a garlic bulb. Here’s what you need to know about garlic and eating more than just the cloves.
What is Garlic
Garlic is a bulbous flowering plant also known as an allium. It’s relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, and more. This makes the etymology of the word garlic a bit more clear. The word comes from the Old English word garleac where gar means spear and leac means leek, so a spear-shaped leek. The plant’s stem can grow up to 3-feet tall, like a spear.
What Garlic Tastes Like
Fresh garlic gets its sharp spicy flavor from sulfur-based compounds housed within the clove’s cells. When a clove of garlic is chopped or chewed, enzymes in the clove then trigger the breakdown of those compounds. The result is, well, delicious. But also, the result is newly created compounds. Those compounds are what you smell and taste. When cooked, heat transforms those compounds even further, giving garlic a slightly sweet and almost buttery flavor.
A similar reaction happens when onions are chopped. The resultant compounds from chopping onions, which are also sulfur-based, are what makes some people cry.
How is Garlic Grown
Garlic is a perennial plant with a tall stem that can grow up to 3-feet high (remember the spear?). The bulb grows underground and has to be hand harvested. The plant’s bulb is typically made up of 10 to 20 cloves. Cloves closest to the center tend to be symmetrical compared to those in the outer part of the bulb. It’s flowers are a pinkish purple.
Sexual propagation of garlic is possible, but garlic is typically propagated asexually by planting individual cloves.
Where Garlic is Grown
In 2021, the world produced 28 million tons of garlic. China alone produced 73% of that. Other top growers include India, South Korea, Egypt, and Spain.
Here in the U.S., pretty much all garlic is grown in California; over 90%. No surprise there. California grows over 50% of the nation’s produce. And you should 100% check out California Grown to learn more about that.
How to Buy American Garlic
I’m just gonna say it. Buy American grown garlic. Why? A lot of times the regulations in other countries for how food is grown, handled, transported, and stored is…suspicious to say the least. But U.S. standards are high. And California standards are typically even higher. And this state not only grows most of your food, we often lead the way. We also lead the way in food safety and sustainability. And when you are buying American garlic, you are pretty much buying California grown garlic.
So how do you know if it is California grown? The roots. American grown garlic still has its roots attached. All imported garlic has the roots chopped off. The more you know!
Christopher Ranch
Thanks to California Grown, I recently visited the only family-owned and -operated commercial garlic farm in the United States: Christopher Ranch. Located in Gilroy, California, Christopher Ranch is the largest grower of California Heirloom Garlic. Founded in 1956, they farm nearly 6,000 acres across the state. And the founder, Don Christopher, co-founded the state’s world famous Gilroy Garlic Festival in 1979.
How Is Garlic Used
Garlic is used around the world for its strong, spicy, and distinct flavor. The plant’s bulb is the most commonly used part, specifically the cloves. But other parts are also edible.
The leaves and flowers are sometimes eaten. Garlic that has yet to mature is sometimes pulled early and sold as green garlic, used much like that of a green onion. Additionally, immature stems (typically referred to as scapes) are sometimes used just like asparagus.
Rarely eaten parts of the garlic plant include the white papery skin that covers the cloves. But you can in fact eat it!
Culinary Use
Native to Asia, garlic has a long culinary history that spans several thousands of years. It was cultivated in Mesopotamia for over 4,000 years. Consumed both by ancient Greek and Roman soldiers, sailors, and the rural classes, and well-preserved garlic was even found in the tomb of Tutankhamun!
Garlic was rarely used in traditional English cuisine but is fairly common to those cuisines surrounding the Mediterranean.
Other Uses
Garlic has been used in folk medicine everywhere from China to Egypt to Rome. Pliny named numerous conditions in which garlic was beneficial in his encyclopedic work, Natural History. And modern research continues to study the medicinal potential of garlic to this day.
Outside of medicine, garlic has been used in the development of adhesives and eco-friendly pesticides. Its uses seem almost limitless.
How to Eat Garlic Skin
Now you know a bit more about what garlic is, how it is grown, its history, and what is and isn’t eaten. While the papery skins are typically discarded, they too are completely edible.
Over 40% of all the food in America is thrown away. That is about 145 billion meals every year. Eating the white papery skins of a garlic bulb is just another way to fight food waste.
How to Store a Garlic Bulb
First thing first. You want your garlic to last until you are ready to use, right? So here is how to store a fresh whole bulb of garlic. Store whole bulbs in a cool dark place. Not the fridge. Stored this way, they can keep for months.
Garlic Skin Nutrition
The skin on a garlic bulb is very nutrient dense and high in fiber. It is a great source of vitamin A, C, E, and numerous other antioxidants.
How to Peel Garlic
When it comes to peeling a bulb of garlic, you have many options. My favorite method for peeling a whole bulb is the jar method. Add the bulb to a quart-sized mason jar with the lid. Make sure the lid is tight. Then shake the hell out of the jar for about 10 or so. The white papery skin from the bulb will fall off but the cloves themselves will also be peeled.
How to Store Fresh Garlic Cloves
With your bulb of garlic peeled, you now have 10 to 20 cloves to use up or store. Keep in mind, once you break the seal on a bulb of garlic, they tend to only keep for a few weeks or so after.
My advice, store garlic how you use it. You have options. But pick a solution that matches your cooking style. You can freeze it, you can keep garlic cloves in the fridge for months with this hack, or my go-to method, freezing garlic that is ready to use.
How to Clean the Garlic Skins
You probably have never cleaned garlic skins. Garlic, like bananas, has its own packaging, the clove skin. It’s that tight sheath around the clove that is a pain in the ass to remove. It also protects the tasty cloves from dirt and other bits.
But since we are going to eat the white papery skins and also the clove skins, we need to clean them. Add the skins to warm water with 1 tablespoon of baking soda. Let soak for 15 minutes. Rinse thoroughly.
How to Dry Garlic Skins
With the bulbs peeled, the skins cleaned, and the cloves sorted, now you need to dry out the skins. This step is very important. The skins must be fully dried to process but also to store the final product.
You can air dry the skins by placing the cleaned garlic skins on a cooling rack and letting them air dry for 48 hours. You can microwave them on high for 30 seconds. You can also bake them. Bake the garlic skins on a baking sheet at 150 degrees F for a couple of hours.
Depending on the size, number of peels, moisture in your garlic, and other factors, the time it takes to fully dry the skins can vary. You know they are dry when you can crumble them by hand.
How to Use Garlic Skins
Your skins are now ready to use. You have some options here. Well, decisions. Do you want to use them now or later and how do you want to use them.
It is easier to process a bunch of the skins at once. So after they are cleaned and dried, I typically add the skins to a freezer-safe bag and store them. Once I have the skins from about 10 bulbs, I process them. That is, turn them into a garlic skin powder.
However, you can also use them before.
How to Use Whole Garlic Skins
Once your skins are clean and ready to use, you can simply just use them. Or you can freeze them as I mentioned, and use them as needed.
You can simply add the whole garlic skins to a large pot of water with other veggie scraps to make a homemade soup stock. You can also add them to the water when cooking pasta, rice, boiling potatoes, all of the things.
I suggest you tie them up in some cheese cloth anytime you are cooking them with something you plan to eat. For example, you strain homemade stock completely, so not needed. But for rice, they may be harder to find, and they are a choking hazzard when whole.
By using them whole, you can infuse whatever you are cooking with nutrients from the peels. They will impart a subtle garlic flavor which may be more noticeable in say rice and less in a more involved recipe.
How to Make Garlic Skin Powder
This is my preferred option as I can add it to really any recipe and you get the bonus of a bit more flavor and fiber. Add the dried peels to a food processor, blender, or even a coffee grinder can work. Whatever you use, cover with a towel to stop any dust from escaping. Process the garlic skins until a powder is formed. The result may be more like garlic skin flakes – that is also ok.
Store the powder in an airtight container, in a cool and dark place, and it will keep for 6 months to a year.
You can mix the powder into your pasta sauces, soups, chili, and more. Try it in your savory bread recipes. It works great with focaccia! I love it mashed into my avocado toast or mixed up in my scrambled eggs. Just whisk it into the eggs! So many options.
Because you are eating the actual skin, you will get more garlic flavor from the garlic skin powder than you do with the whole skins. It is still pretty subtle.
Can You Eat Garlic Sprouts
Yes, yes you can eat them. This happens. It’s natural. Christopher Ranch even confirmed it. The green things that sometimes push up through the bulb are sprouts and entirely save to eat. Use them just like you would green onions.