Garlic suggestions for the North

I decided I wanted to try my hand at planting garlic and have been waiting to buy for fall planting. Well it's time...lol. I've been looking at all the varieties of hardneck...from what I read that is the most winter hardy. Problem is the choices are overwhelming and thought I would ask other northerners what is your favorite variety and why...lol ???

My first goal is flavor first, production second. I see a lot of sampler packs out there and may go that route for a variety. Also looking at sites Gourmet Garlic and the The Garlic Store, both have great feedback anybody have a favorite or another suggestion on who they would buy from ??

Appreciate the input !!!

~Julie =0)

I'm growing garlic for the first time, also. I bought the "all star sampler" from The Garlic Store plus one extra elephant "garlic" since our family really likes that one. Although I don't have any advise, I'd be interested to see what you end up with.

I think for my first choice I'm leaning toward the

**exotic hardneck sampler pack::

Marino - a hard to find rocomabole with a punchy flavor all its own
Stull - a porcelain with gold tinged wrappers and big, big cloves
Gautemalen Ikeda - from the village of Huehuetenango; this purple stripe will grow almost anywhere; the flavor is mild but distinctive
Korean Red-- large burgandy cloves. HOT! From the country that eats more garlic than any other. Did we say HOT!?
Rosewood - a porcelain with deep purple skins; big cloves, bigger taste
Morado Gigante - from Chile, the deep burgundy colored skins are as distinctive as the rich flavor

**My second choice at this point is the cold winter hardneck sampler pack::

Spanish Roja - the favorite of many, this rocambole has perhaps the perfect garlic taste
Polish Hardneck - huge, white procelain bulbs; very large, easy-to-peel cloves; real heat for the Kielbasa
Bogatyr - this beautiful purple stripe sizes up very well and is almost too pretty to eat... but you will soon savor its superior taste; Ukraine is the likely origin
German Porcelain - massive bulbs; great to fun to watch grow...scapes can often reach 5 or 6 feet tall!
Vekak Czeck - central European import; a pruple stripe whose clove's flavor is even more impressive after cooking
German Red - the Tuetonic champ of rocamboles; try to imagine German cooking without garlic!

The all star sampler has a very good selection. I think there are too many choices to make it an easy decision for me...lol

~Julie =0)

I know what you mean about choises - I think we should get them all... oh, wait, I don't think our pocketbooks would agree - but a nice thought, anyway :-) You're a bit colder than we, so all star probably works for me, but an all hardneck sampler probably do better for you. Some winters, I've heard, we are a zone 7, but then we'll get a few harsher ones to remind us that we are not Really a zone 7. As a garlic growing newby myself, I'm interested how your stinking rose garden grows. I bought some impulse irises and had nowhere with actual soil to plant them in, so they're in my veggie bed... so now DH is building me another bed tomorrow and it will become home for the garlic for the next 10 -11 months.

Once I clear a little bit more space, I plan to plant some garlic myself. I'm probably most interested in garlic that stores well. I'm concerned about it either sprouting or drying up, which is what store bought garlic tends to do.

I'm thinking that hanging it in the garage might do well to overwinter it. It's an attached garage, so it would absorb some heat from the house, enough probably to keep it from being freezing in there.

I also need to figure out how best to store potatoes to keep them from sprouting or going bad. This is my first time as a gardener.

I love garlic but can't take really spicy food, so that's a consideration. I could try a small amount of really spicy garlic. If it's really hot for me, I suppose I could just mince it fine or crush it and use much less of it.

I'm looking forward to trying other kinds of garlic than the couple varieties you find in a typical supermarket.

When we bought our home we moved in during the late fall months, just before snow. The following spring I decided I wanted to put in a small vegetable garden and chose my starting point at the stone wall which was only 8-10 ft from the back of the house. Turns out once we started digging that it was originally a root cellar that the owners before us had caved in the roof and 2 of the retaining walls to just below the soil level. I've been bummed ever since thinking of all the goodies I could have used it for...lol.

Although I try to cheer myself up by telling myself it was probably creepy in there and I wouldn't have liked it anyway...lol But it would have been a good place for taters and garlic !!!

~Julie =0)

WH ~ growing up in Mn, we stored potatoes in a cool dark place for the winter. Had a basement with a 'fruit room'. Canned goodies were kept on shelves there as well as root vegies. We would take green tomatoes at end of season and wrap in newspaper. When wanting some, unwrap and set on a windowsill to ripen. Would enjoy fresh till around the holidays. We would store apples in the same manner. Packing the wrapped fruit in slatted wooden boxes for air ventilation. Onions and garlic would hang in mesh bags or woven in the same location. Do you have basement space that is cooler than the house?