I live in the Greater Toronto Area, so timing of things may be a little different for your area. The garlic we grow is called Music and is a hardneck variety. It was developed by an Ontario Farmer by the name of Al Music and is particularly good for growing condition in Ontario. We picked up seed garlic bulbs at a county fair. Getting a local variety of garlic is probably a good idea.
Planting happens in the fall. We plant in early October. Break your head of garlic into individual cloves. Plant them about 2 inches deep with pointy end up. Space them apart enough to account for a bulb. I think that’s about 6 inches (and probably depends on the size of your variety).
In the spring, you should see shoots come out of the ground. We fertilize with a little of Miracle-gro. The central stalk is known as a scape. It is what will flower if you let it. Don’t let it. It will start to curl. When your scapes have curled all the way around, it is time to cut the scapes off. They have a garlicky flavour and are an excellent addition to a stir fry.
When the leaves go all brown, it is time to harvest the garlic. Yank them out of the grown and brush off any clinging soil. The bulbs need to be dried out unto the skin is papery like you find in the supermarket garlic. Place them in a dark cool place for drying out.
I plant my garlic in late October or early November. It will do some rooting under the soil but you shouldn’t see any growth above ground until March.
I have never had any issues growing garlic. Plant it in late fall, I usually give it a straw or leaf cover for the winter, uncover once the worst of winter is over, and make sure to cut the scapes if you get a variety that produces them! I have read that once you pull the bulbs they should be removed from sun as soon as possible and dried in a place that won’t get direct sun. I just use a metal wire shelf in my garage.
The other thing I like about garlic is that it lets you get out and garden a bit after the rest of your garden is dead. It’ll also be one of the first plants up in spring, so seeing it poking out of the ground is always exciting. In Michigan, I tend to end up harvesting in early to mid-July when I’m not getting much out of my garden. Rule of thumb I use is to pull it when half of the leaves are brown.
You wouldn’t want to cook them, but they have a very strong onion flavor, I find it significantly stronger than the chives themselves, so would probably work well anywhere you’d use raw onion.
My wife does most of the gardening but I’m responsible at least for bringing some things in, mostly fruiting things because I like things that you eat. So several years back I started getting us pineapples (my buddy was moving and dug up like 6 of them for me) and also we planted the tops of a few store bought ones. Flash forward and we have like 15 plants right now, but in that whole time I’ve gotten a single tiny pineapple that didn’t taste very good, and a few that animals ate for us. Well hopefully that is about to change as we put a cage around one that was looking good and just got it picked.
I got an oven like yours. I wiped that LCD panel with a clock with a sponge and the unit started beeping like crazy because the pad shorted out. (Kitchenaid)
Had to remove the thing, clean it with some alcohol and dry it out. Kinda a dumb design if those things can’t get wet.
Ok so I ate this with the family today at what I’m going to call peak ripeness, and holy cow. I wasn’t expecting much, but I think it may have been one of the best pineapples I’ve ever tasted. I’m not exaggerating either, I really expected it to be crap like the last one I grew. It was not nearly as tart as usual and was almost creamy. Damn, that made me happy.
