We love to share what we love... and we love garlic and shallots! You'll find gorgeous seed garlic & shallots listed here every late Summer/early Fall. And don't forget the fertility... our Organic Garlic and Shallot Fertilizer has specially blended diverse amendments to feed both our soil and our alliums, and in turn, us!
You’re right, some garlic is easier to peel than others and what’s going on? Let me tell you. So imagine each of these cloves of the each bulb of garlic, it’s surrounded by bulb wrappers. And there’s one that is particularly closest to it. Imagine that as shrink wrap, storing it, protecting it so that you can keep it all winter long or as long as possible. So some varieties, their shrink wrap is more dramatically shrink wrapped than others. So if they’re less dramatically shrink graft, they’re not as holding tight to each clove, they’re easier to peel. That also means there’s more gas exchange, which also means there’s going to be more oxidation and more desiccation. So, in easy to peel varieties of garlic that generally correlates very directly to that garlic variety, not storing as long as other varieties that are harder to peel.
So in fact, This is our Italy Hill and it’s a porcelain hardneck. There’s the hardneck sure as day and yes, this is a fantastic variety. It has a long storage life for a porcelain type. But really by January, certainly early February, it’s starting to get a little on the desiccated and soft side. It’s super easy to peel in the fall. So we are and it’s just delicious. It’s one of my favorite varieties. So we are eating this Italy Hill as quick as we can across the fall into the winter so that we can be sure to enjoy every single clove by the time it’s getting too soft and going past its prime.
This is our Regatusso. it’s an artichoke softneck so fantastic as well, and it’s the most regionally adapted cold hardy softneck that I’ve ever experienced. And this is not easy to peel in the fall, but Here’s the thing, by the time Italy Hill is past her prime, and we’re we’re down to our last few bulbs, this Regatusso suddenly, because it’s the winter and it’s in storage, and those cloves have been slowly, subtly desiccating in storage, they now are easy to peel. So there’s this magical alchemy that happens as the easy to peel garlic in the fall. Yes, it’s easy to peel. So peel it, eat it, it won’t store that long and by the time it has gone, gone through its prime. Now, all of a sudden, your hard to peel varieties are coming into their own in terms of they’re easier to peel than ever.
And now you know, it’s true. Some varieties store better than others. There’s a direct relationship with the ease of peeling, and that’s why we grow a bunch of different garlic varieties. among so many other reasons, so that we can have garlic all throughout the year, each one in its own time, easy to peel.
