It’s all about the Garlic

Garlic – Green garlic – Black garlic

Garlic: is a species in the onion family. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, and chive. Garlic has been used throughout history for both culinary and medicinal purposes. The garlic plant’s bulb is the most commonly used part of the plant. With the exception of the single clove types, the bulb is divided into numerous fleshy sections called cloves. The cloves are used for cloning, consumption (raw or cooked), or for medicinal purposes, and have a characteristic pungent, spicy flavor that mellows and sweetens considerably with cooking. The leaves, and flowers (bulbils) on the head (spathe) are also edible and are most often consumed while immature and still tender. Additionally, the immature flower stalks (scapes) of the hardneck and elephant types are sometimes marketed for uses similar to asparagus in stir-fries. The papery, protective layers of “skin” over various parts of the plant are generally discarded during preparation for most culinary uses, though in Korea immature whole heads are sometimes prepared with the tender skins intact. The root cluster attached to the basal plate of the bulb is the only part not typically considered palatable in any form.

Green garlic: also called young garlic, is exactly what it sounds like: the green shoots of immature garlic bulbs that have been picked early.Green garlic, a handful of which resembles a bunch of shapely scallions, is delicate in flavor, without the dominant notes of mature garlic.
Like the early weeks of spring, green garlic is a fleeting pleasure. Although farmers can grow garlic year-round, it’s usually planted in the fall and harvested in late spring, which means that green garlic will appear for a month or two at most in early spring. Farmers have historically picked green garlic to thin out their crop, bringing baskets of the early greens to market to sell as a secondary crop, a kind of seasonal teaser for what’s to come. A pile of the delicate stalks discovered on a market stand in the early weeks of spring can seem like a sudden gift. Early spring can come in mid-February in Southern California, and green garlic is usually gone by April.

Especially if it’s quite young, treat green garlic like you would scallion, mincing the whole stalk and adding it to omelets, stir-fries and soups. It’s even mild enough to add raw to salads. Instead of mincing the garlic, sauté the stalks whole so they intertwine with the pasta when tossed with it in a bowl.
Want a rustic dish that takes only about 15 minutes to make. Top plates of pasta and green garlic with eggs fried in the garlic-laced oil, and an abundant amount of coarse black pepper and sea salt.

Black garlic: is a type of fermented garlic, the cloves are jet black!
Black garlic is regular garlic that has undergone a special fermentation process which turns it a black color. It is made by fermenting whole bulbs of garlic at high temperature. The taste is sweet and syrupy with hints of balsamic or even tamarind plus, the garlic has more muted garlic flavors, with a taste somewhat like roasted garlic but with almost licorice tones. It seems almost like a soft, jelly-like piece of fruit. Black garlic’s popularity has spread In the United States, entering the mainstream in 2008 as it has become a sought-after ingredient used in high-end cuisine.
It is unrelated to a genetically unique six-clove garlic also called black garlic used as a food ingredient in Asian cuisine, and used in countries such as Korea.
Black garlic has a long history in the cuisine of Korea and Thailand. It is prized as a food rich in antioxidants and added to energy drinks, and in Thailand is claimed to increase the consumer’s longevity.

Tags: Blog, Cooking Tips, Healthy cooking