Wow.. it’s been a while since I posted an actual recipe or how-to kinda post, or rather any post without links to other places. I apologize. I’ve been really busy; Jay was on vacation this past week, we got engaged, etc, etc. You know how it is.

Anyway, any reader of the blog that’s been a reader for longer than a few months will know I love to putter around in the dirt & have a garden. In addition to flowers (especially lilies & roses) which I love to grow, I’ve grown my own food. Eggplant, cucumber, zucchini squash, Romaine lettuce, tomatoes (both heirloom & not), peppers of all kinds, and one of just about every herb available. It’s been a dream of mine to someday have a massive garden where I grow at least one of everything I love- including carrots & broccoli, and to expand into more exotic herbs such as purple basil, etc. I’d also like to buy some berry bushes, since I tried one once (blueberry) and failed.

However, I haven’t gotten into growing onions, garlic or any kind of edible bulb-thingy until now.

I stumbled upon quite a few how-to’s on regrowing kitchen scraps like garlic, and then I saw this one. It just so happened that not only did I have some coffee cans left from that cake, but I had a few old cloves of garlic that were starting to sprout. I thought I’d combine them with a few other cloves and see if I could grow my own garlic indoors.

One can never have too much garlic around. Especially since it seems I make more pickles & Italian dishes (like pizza with homemade sauce) that require fresh garlic than anything! And even better if I can do it inside, on my windowsill.

In a coffee can.

Four days after planting!

Here’s what I did:

• Using a hammer & nail, I poked holes in the bottom of a coffee can*. I didn’t want to use a can opener, because I had no extra screen or cheesecloth laying around to cover the holes to prevent the soil from washing out. I decided 5-6 holes per 13 oz. can was plenty. If you’re using a larger size can then obviously more holes are needed. If you use a coffee can, keep the plastic lids and use them as water-catchers under the cans.
• I filled the cans up with a sandy soil**, then I watered them until the water came out of the bottom. I let it sit, until all the water was out and it didn’t drip when I lifted it.
• While the water was draining, I separated my garlic cloves. You want to keep as much of the skin or papery stuff on as possible, so don’t peel them! If you’ve got cloves that are sprouting already, then obviously use those. Otherwise you can use any garlic cloves as long as they’re fresh, not preserved or from a jar and they aren’t peeled. I decided to put 6-7 cloves in each can, assuming some might not grow.
• I pushed the cloves into the soil, flat side down/pointy side up, a few inches in. The garlic can be close to other cloves, but just don’t cram them in so much that they’re touching. A far as depth, I’d say you want (at least) anywhere from 1/2″ – 1″ of soil covering the garlic.
• Cover them with soil and pat it down gently. Place them in a sunny spot, like a kitchen window that gets a lot of morning light. Water often & keep soil moist but not soaked.
• As soon as you get green shoots that are a couple of inches high, you can snip them off (leave 1″). They can be used just like chives, as a topping on salads or in other dishes; the flavor is a very light, delicate garlic taste.

*you can also use a large tomato can or just a flowerpot.
**I mixed a few tablespoons of sand into my soil before filling the cans, but if you live in an area where the soil is already naturally sandy then you can skip this step.

Garlic likes sandy loamy soil, so a good potting mixture with some sand mixed in is your best bet. Also, they like compost fertilizer. So if you have a compost heap that would be the best stuff to use. Other than that, a good ol’ fashioned blood meal works. That said… if you’re keeping them indoors in a small can, I don’t know if this will matter. Especially if you use a fertilized potting soil like Miracle-Gro.

Or you can just do nothing & use regular soil. If my original cloves started to sprout in my house without the benefit of soil, sun or fertilizer, I bet you really don’t need to do much once they’re planted. Those pictures were taken- I kid you not- four days after planting my cloves! FOUR DAYS. I literally had these shoots after just four days. This next photo was after six days.

Once I planted these babies, they literally exploded.

They might turn out to be crowded in there, so I might transplant some to a larger container, possibly move them outdoors. We’ll see how it goes. I started this in late May and as you can see below, tons of things have changed since the above photos. I still have no idea where this is going, though!  I’m not fully sure if I’ll grow more bulbs this way or just scapes, but I would assume that eventually I’ll get garlic bulbs.

Garlic scapes are the long, winding, almost blue green shoot that hardneck garlic varieties put out in the spring. Scapes have a fresh, mild garlic taste and make the best pesto I have ever had. They can also be used to glorify mashed potatoes, salads, roasted vegetables or stir-fries.

Harvest scapes when they are young and tender. Once they have curled around in a circle, they are ready for picking. Picking the scape not only is not only good for cooking, it will actually help your garlic grow bigger and better – up to 35%.

– about.com

I want to try this with onions as well… especially since I have a tendency to just throw away onions when they sprout (I know, shame on me) & possibly with leeks or green onions too. It’s amazing what you can grow from things you’d normally toss. I’m even growing a pineapple from the top of a fresh one I used!

They just keep on growin’!

Note: some people will say not to use store-bought garlic, just to use garlic you buy at a nursery, etc. These are the same people who tell you not to buy Heinz ketchup because of the high fructose corn syrup. And I get it, I do. I’m just not that insane about things… I’m too laid back for that. I like having fun, experimenting, & doing things randomly at 2 a.m. which doesn’t always afford me extra time to go looking for the right garlic bulb for planting. So if that means using some cloves of garlic I have in my kitchen instead of hunting down a specific variety, then so be it. Do as you will.

And of course I’ll keep everyone updated with the status of my (not so) little garlic babies.