MARBLED garlic plants are tall, have wide curvaceous leaves and stout scapes that are ideal for grilling. Often dappled with dark purple, bulbs can get quite large and contain 5-7 squat tan to brown cloves with thick skins that are relatively easy to peel. A small percentage of Marbled will produce weak stems that become pliable enough to enable braiding. Marbleds store fairly well and tend to be quite pungent. Some of these have produced true seed. A pound of Marbled seed garlic will yield 35-40 cloves. Marbleds are $11 per ¼ lb; $17 per ½ lb; $27 per lb. Note that orders under 1 lb. will inevitably include smaller sized bulbs.
Tengri Tagh: from the far west China province of Xinjiang (meaning “new territory”), homeland of the Uyghur and Xibe peoples, comes this spicy, colorful strain. The Uyghur language is Turkic, like those of other Central Asian peoples with whom they are related linguistically and religiously. Garlic would translate as “samsaq” depending on transliteration. Tengri Tagh is the Uyghur name for the Tien Shan Mountains close to which lies the center of origin of garlic. I have renamed this variety which had been circulating in the US as “Bai Pi Suan” which literally translates from Mandarin as “white (bai) skin (pi) garlic (suan)”. China does export mesh tubes of white papered garlic, a Turban type grown in low iron soil. Tengri Tagh, like other Marbled garlic types, is mottled with purple. Until the mid 18th century, northern Xinjiang was populated by the Dzungar people. The Qing perpetrated genocide, exterminating nearly a million people, effectively clearing the lands for settlement by Han Chinese, Xibe and expansion of Uyghurs, who had mostly inhabited the Tarim Basin in southern Xinjiang. Han settlement expanded under Mao and has increasingly dominated the region. The Uyghurs have been shut out of employment opportunities, been religiously persecuted, their language and culture suppressed, mosques, shrines, even cemeteries destroyed. Since 2017 well over a million Uyghurs, Hui, Kazakhs and other Muslim ethnic minorities have and continue to be detained in indoctrination/concentration camps, their labor exploited for a wide range of manufactured goods. All told, this is the largest scale ongoing ethnic cleansing campaign in the world. One thing that Uyghur, Hui and Xibe have in common with the Han Chinese is that garlic favors heavily in all their cuisines and this fiery garlic may have been consumed by all with great relish over the last few thousand years.
Jupiter: This garlic is named for the largest planet in our solar system, indeed more than twice the size as all other planets combined. While bulb isn’t that large, it does size up considerably. If the the plants are impressive for their size, the voluminous root mass at harvest is equally so. Jupiter, the garlic, is dense and sulfurous; Jupiter the planet, a gas giant, composed largely of hydrogen and helium is oblate, like a bulb of garlic. While the vast planet shines bright, the plants cast shadows upon those in their orbit. It is hoped that Jovian seeds will make for many moons to orbit their elder god as the Romans would refer to it.
Estonian Red: Charismatically colossal plants really stand out in the field. Big bulbs with the usual purple coloration on thick peels. Not quite as spicy as Jupiter raw, it’s great when roasted. Don’t over-fertilize this one as the giant bulbs can split.
Russian Giant: The seed for this from the town of Kungur, Russia, in the Ural Mountains. This isn’t an agricultural region and given it’s impressiveness, i assume it’s widely grown. My sample is from Door County Garlic in WI. “Giant” is a bit of an understatement as the heads are frequently over 1/4 lb. The plants are colossal as well. I am seldom able to coax TGS out of these and even then, germination is extremely low and yet these enormous Marbled are so impressive, i’ll keep trialing cultivars until one really produces seeds.