Garlic Cleaning Day

In my last post 11 days ago I mentioned that I harvested garlic.  I hung the garlic in the basement for all this time to cure.  Garlic needs a curing time of 10-14 days and that makes it better for long term storage.  So today I spent the afternoon cleaning it up and preparing it for our market booth this Thursday.   It was a nice cool, low humidity day - only 69 for a high temp.  I took everything out on the porch and spent time listening to all the animal life around the yard.   Birds were singing, the trumpeter swans were honking, the bees were buzzing, the wind was whispering through the trees, and every now and then I would hear the splash of the beavers in the pond.  It was all very relaxing and a good break from worrying about covid and the craziness of the world!

I took everything out on our front porch to work with, as cleaning garlic can be a dirty job. 

I used scissors to cut off the dry stems to about an inch above the garlic head, and used a soft old toothbrush to scrub away dry soil.  Also trimmed the roots to 1/4 inch with scissors.   It took me most of the afternoon to clean over 100 heads of garlic, but it was very relaxing. 

This is what the garlic looks like before cleaning and trimming.

I ended up with a nice big box full of garlic to sell at market.  I usually package up several sizes in a bag to sell, so that a cook has options as to what size garlic to use. 

Fresh garlic has a very mild and mellow taste, unlike older boxed garlic you buy at the store.  Old garlic can have a very strong and pungent taste, sometimes almost rancid.   Fresh garlic is very smooth tasting and quite mild when cooked.    Many supermarkets sell garlic from China.   Please don't buy that!  Be sure to look at the country of origin.  Garlic is very easy to grow, so I am surprised that our country would even import garlic. 
     While sitting on the porch I enjoyed just looking at the scenery.  It is always so peaceful here on the farm.

A view of our pasture land and part of the lower garden and some of our woodland. 

A view of our lake and some of the wildflowers that support our bees, and more of our woodland area. 

I've been picking a quart of raspberries every day, and now there will be another fruit to pick!  Gooseberries!  They are very sweet to eat when they are dark red.

Lots of gooseberries ready to pick.  When the berries turn dark red, they are ready to pick and eat.  One has to be careful picking, though, as the bushes have sharp thorns.   You can see some of these thorns in the photo.   These gooseberries are almost an inch in diameter. 

I used some of the fresh garlic today while cooking our lunch.  We enjoyed baked chicken, a vegetable rice casserole, and some freshly picked yellow crookneck squash cooked with garlic and butter and Parmesan cheese.  For dessert we had peaches with fresh raspberries from the back yard.  Yum!