HOME & GARDEN: Stephenson, Gamble reap the benefits of growing garlic at home
BY SCOTT STEPHENSON
When my wife Chelsea and I first embarked on our journalistic journey of chaos gardening, it was way back in the olden days, when all the hope and excitement that would accompany our decision to move to a place we’d never heard of before was but a gleam in our big ‘ole west end Toronto eyes. As people that were renting a tiny apartment that we would never have a chance to ever own, we still wanted to do our best to grow edible things, because growing your own edible things is best. We started the same way that most urban apartment dwellers do - on a tiny, basically unsafe, third floor patio the size of a postage stamp with a tiny little tomato plant in a plastic pot that produced weird little fruit of which we were tremendously proud.
We may not have known what we were doing back then, but that little tomato plant instilled in us a shared, just-married passion for all things deep-rooted and delicious. As much as we yearned to commune with nature, when we did decide to strike out in search of a place that was a little less Toronto, we were almost exclusively thinking about getting away from the hustle and bustle of city life and the attic apartment head bumping that comes along with it.
We wanted to find a place that would facilitate a simpler kind of existence where we could stretch out our cramped city legs and learn to be just a touch more self reliant. When we did find this quaint little town nestled in the heart of one of Ontario’s most fertile agricultural regions, never in our wildest dreams did we consider the possibility of growing our very own garlic, which feels absolutely wild now, since this place is such a perfect place to turn our allium dreams into a reality. We even first learned that Lucknow, Ontario was a real place from the label on a box of fresh garlic that we acquired from a pricey little 100 kilometre grocery store on Roncesvalles in the west end. Even still, it felt like garlic was the kind of food stuff that only other people could grow - you know, like real farmers.
We turned out to be double lucky when it came to the art of living in a rural community where we knew next to nobody. Not only were we able to settle into our unusual new home, but we soon became acquainted with a real life farmer located in the nearby town of Belgrave - Robert Foreman, of 100 Mile Produce, who has no time to waste when it comes to getting down and dirty in the fields. We’ve received a front row view of his legendary local produce business that involves selling some of Huron County’s best vegetables at farmers markets across Southwestern Ontario. Seasonally, Foreman offers everything from green onions to cabbages, but one of his absolute best sellers is, you guessed it - garlic!
For years, we enjoyed fresh, flavourful Ontario garlic directly off of farmer’s market tables, by the quart and by the pound, but it never felt like something that we could grow ourselves, right up until the moment that we realized that we could totally grow it ourselves. And by realized, I mean that people kept telling us how easy it was. Foreman was kind enough to set us on the path to garlicky success with a big mesh bag of loose, home grown cloves that he assured us needed only to be stuck into the ground as autumn drew to a close in order to produce our very own culinary flavour bombs. Receiving that literal seed fund was the first step on the path to what has become our current state of maximum garlic overdrive.
The second first step was a somewhat laborious process that involved working tirelessly under the hot November sun with the unflagging fervor and unwavering determination of two people who pretty much have no idea what they’re doing.
Next came the planting phase! Using a pointy little stick known as a dibber, we created rows upon rows of holes in which we carefully nestled the individual garlic cloves that would hopefully multiply in the womb of the earth. Once each clove was planted, we allowed the seasons to change from fall to winter, and eventually spring. When all the snow finally melted away, it gave way to emergent shoots of tender green leaves - a sign, we’d been told, that our garlic was taking root and beginning to thrive. With each passing day, the plants grew taller and stronger.
Suddenly, the summer season arrived again, all ablaze with warmth and sunshine. We tended that first crop with care, snipping off scapes and keeping a watchful eye out for any signs of pests or disease.
As the days grew shorter and the air turned crisp, the time finally came to harvest our garlic. With bated, ungarlicky breath and eager anticipation, we began pulling up a few test bulbs. Our hearts soared with joy at the sight of plump heads of fragrant garlic coming out of the earth of our very own yard. That harvest turned out to be plentiful, exceeding our wildest expectations. Basket after basket was filled with little bundles of stinky joy. We then became garlic preservers, learning how to dry, pickle, ferment and confit the stuff in order to ensure that we’d never run out of the wonderful stuff. Of course, we also set aside many of our prime cloves to plant in the fall.
Growing garlic in our yard turned out to be not only easy, fun and delicious, it helped us turn our new yard into a space where our dreams could take root and flourish.