Our best crop on our Hobby Farm is garlic. The deer don’t like it and the cold doesn’t hurt it. We plant our garlic in the fall just before freezing weather. You don’t need any special seeds just use the garlic that you enjoy eating. Break open the head and separate the cloves. Don’t peel off the little cover around each clove. We plant our garlic up on the top of the row, cover it with dirt and leave it to sleep during the winter. It will be covered in snow but when spring comes and the snow melts little sprots pop out. If you plant too early before the cold weather it will pop out before the snow. It will be ok, but remember the next fall don’t be too anxious to plant and wait until the cold is almost there.
Now our garlic is growing and so is the grass. Be careful, don’t hoe around the plant you will cut the garlic growing underground. We hoe the middles and pull the grass around the plants. If you wait until it rains the next day the ground is soft and the grass will pull out without upsetting the garlic plant. Notice I have some more grass pulling to do. If you have a dry spell you may need to water your garlic but they don’t like too much water. One year we had a lot of rain and some of the garlic rotted in the ground.
In our area by June the garlic is ready to harvest. The tops will start drying, and you can pull one up for dinner. You can see if it is ready to harvest. After we pull the garlic, we spread out the plants so they can dry. Just cardboard boxes will do. When they are dry enough that the dirt falls off, cut the tops and roots off and you have harvested your garlic. It will last all summer but in the winter it is better in a cool spot, We stored them in the cross base and if you have a root cellar it would be great. I dried some and made garlic powder.
To make the garlic powder, slice them, and dry in a dehydrator. If you don’t have one use the oven on low temperature for 3 hours. They should be really dry but not cooked. Grind the dried garlic in a food processor and there you have some pure, health garlic powder. It will keep a long time but be sure it is dry when you grind it up. It should not be sticky it may mold over a long period of time.
Garlic patch before and after de-grassing.
Philippians 4:5 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything; tell God your needs, and don’t forget to thank him for his answers.