I really like cooking with fresh ingredients, garlic, herbs, and vegetables. There’s just something special about it. The rest of the garden has been harvested and the snow looms ahead, but it’s the perfect time to plant garlic.
Now, there are two main types, hard neck and soft neck. Most of your grocery store garlic is hard neck. Soft neck is planted in the spring and harvested in the fall. Hard neck, on the other hand, is planted in the fall and harvested mid summer. You can even plant some in a window sill flowerpot and trim the green part when you need to add a little kick to your dinner.
If your bed is cleaned out for the next growing season, make a little space for garlic. You can buy fancy starts, but a trip to the grocery store is all you need. Just plant the individual cloves four to six inches apart and let mother nature do the rest. My grocery store garlic popped up just fine this spring.