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Asiatic and Turban Varieties of Garlic
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Asiatic and Turban Varieties of Hardneck Garlics
Asiatic and Turban garlics were originally classified as a separate group that was part of the Artichoke garlics but recent DNA research done independently
by a couple of Garlic is Life colleagues of mine, Dr. Gayle Volk of the USDA in Fort Collins, Colorado and Dr. Joachim Keller of the Institute for plant Research in Gaterslaben, Germany, shows them both to be weakly-bolting hardnecks that are distinct from each other as well as the other groups of garlics.
Asiatics and Turban garlics have as many similarities as differences. Asiatics have 8-12 fat cloves, Turbans have about 6 really big cloves.
They are the very earliest harvesting of all garlics and if you can grow them you'll have garlic before anyone else is anywhere near ready to harvest. They are short storing garlics as most don't last more than 5 months at room temperature before sprouting. They are always the first garlics to sprout in the fall.
They are also unusual in that they don't mature gradually like all the other garlics; when they are ready, their tops start to fall over, like onions.
That's too late. The time to check their bulb size and get ready to start harvesting them is in mid-spring before their leaves fall over and they lose all their bulb wrappers, as they will if they stay in the ground for very long after they are ready to be harvested.
If they lose their bulb wrappers, their storage time will be reduced even more than usual.
The secret to success in growing great Asiatic and Turban is to dig down and watch the bulbs develop and when they get big enough to suit you, go ahead and dig them up, don't wait for them to fall over.
You simply have to harvest them before they fall over.
They do seem to grow exceptionally well in dry climates like the southwestern USA, if properly irrigated.
Asiatics and Turbans should be a part of every garlic lover's garden along with long storing ones so you can have fresh garlic all year around.
Asiatics have a few pea-size purple bulbils whereas Turbans have 30 to 100 pinkish rice-size bulbils.
the Asiatic Variety of Hardneck Garlics
Most of the Asiatics I have grown have had stalks (called scapes) that form an upside-down U before straightening up. All cultivars of a given variety of garlic generally have the same scape pattern before they straighten up; all Rocambole scapes form a double loop while Purple Stripe garlics form 3/4 of a loop. Asiatics have a smaller seedhead (properly called an umbel) while Turbans have a larger umbel that resembles a turban. The umbel is covered with a membrane called a spathe and the pointed end of the spathe is called a beak. Asiatics have a beak of 12 to 18 inches, the longest beaks of all garlic varieties. Not all have scapes but most usually do. the umbels are also called bulbil capsules and Asiatic garlics have few but large, pea-size bulbils in their bulbil capsule.
Asiatics usually have 9-12 large fat cloves that form something of a circle around a center that may or may not have a scape. There are few or no tiny interior cloves.
Asiatic garlic's bulb wrappers are often very white but they can have some color some years.
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the Turban Variety of Hardneck Garlic
Turbans usually have 5-7 very large fat cloves that form something of a circle around a center that may or may not have a scape. There are few or no tiny interior cloves.
Turban garlic's bulb wrappers are usually very colorful with lots of purple splotches and stripes. Some cultivars are very white but vividly striped with red/purple vertical lines.
Most of the Turbans I have grown have had stalks (called scapes) that form an upside-down U before straightening up. All cultivars of a given variety of garlic generally have the same scape pattern before they straighten up; all Rocambole scapes form a double loop while Purple Stripe garlics form 3/4 of a loop. Asiatics have a smaller seedhead (properly called an umbel) while Turbans have a larger umbel that resembles a turban. The umbel is covered with a membrane called a spathe and the pointed end of the spathe is called a beak. Turban garlics usually have a beak in the range of 6 to 9 inches or so and have the second-longest beaks of all garlic varities. Not all have scapes but most usually do. Turbans have 30 to 100 small rice-size bulbils in their bulbil capsule.
Some cultivars are instantly hot to the taste while others may be remarkably mild for up to half a minute before you get a very hot taste that spreads from the back of the mouth forward. They can be very pungent and have a musky aftertaste. Not all Turbans are hot although some are but there are also some rich garlicky ones that don't overpower with pungency.
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This Gardener's marketplace is like your local farmer's market.
If you buy from a gardener and later cancel that order and buy from a different gardener, the credit card processing gateway still charges Gourmet Garlic Gardens the full processing
fee plus an additional fee for processing the cancellation and also it places an additional clerical burden on us
so, regrettably, we must charge a 10% cancellation fee when processing the cancellation because that's about what it costs us.
My advice is to look around among the various market gardeners and decide what to buy from whom and then place your orders, one grower at a time and stick with the gardeners you have chosen.
If you would like to try a little garlic from several different gardeners, you can order a sampler assortment and request particular garlics from specific growers.
Click here to check out our sampler Assortments.
When using your credit/debit card to buy direct from different gardeners, a separate order is required for each gardener.
You may buy as many different kinds of garlic as you want from any gardener on any order but each grower requires a separate order.
If you want to order garlic from more than one grower, a separate order must be placed with each gardener.
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How Our Garlics are Grown
Some of our growers are Certified Organic and some are Certified Naturally Grown, which we regard as equal to Certified Organic in every meaningful way but without all the bureaucratic rigamarole. All our market gardeners grow organically/sustainably but not all want to be certified and are among the best available sources of sustainable/organic Garlic We do not allow growers who use synthetic petroleum-based fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides or herbacides to participate in our farmers market.
All garlic in our farmers market is grown in the USA, no imports allowed.
This farmers market is strictly for small-scale American market gardeners/growers who live and grow sustainably..
Asiatic Garlics
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Asiatic garlics typically have about eight cloves per bulb in a circular configuration around a central scape.
They're generally large bulbs with fat cloves. The bulb
wrappers are firm, tight and vivid with broad, bold purple stripes
merging into areas of solid purple. A very strongly colored garlic.
The clove covers are silky and a lovely golden tan with a rosy aura and tiny pink veins.
It is one of the very first cultivars planted in the fall and the first
harvested in the spring around here.
Asian Tempest is an early harvesting hot, strong weakly-bolting Asiatic garlic at a time when nobody else has any.
That's reason enough to grow it right there. If you grow it in conjunction with longer storing garlics, you can have good garlic year around.
Asian Tempest came from South Korea and when you first bite into a clove suddenly your entire mouth seems to explode in flames, your face turns red and you break out in an instant heavy sweat. The fire rages hotter and hotter for about 30 to 45 seconds and you begin to wonder what to do about it, then it begins to gently dissipate and is almost gone at the end of one minute leaving you to discover the rich earthy garlickness hiding behind the heat. It took 30 to 45 minutes for the hair on the back of my neck to dry-just from a half of a clove.
I no longer wonder where fire breathing dragons come from in Asian folklore - they're ordinary people who have eaten too much of these fiery garlics.
While it is not the hottest garlic I have ever tasted, it isn't any too far behind. In my limited experience, (I've only tasted 50 kinds) Metechi and Skuri #2 (Purple Stripes) are a little hotter and perhaps Wild Buff and Rosewood, too-both porcelains. If you want a powerful early harvesting garlic that will leave you breathless, or should I say breathful, try a few of these two Chinese firecrackers, they should have a very high allicin potential and be good medicinal or insecticide garlics-but make sure your fire insurance premiums are paid up first.
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Asiatic garlics typically have six to ten cloves per bulb in a circular configuration around a central scape. They're generally large bulbs with fat cloves. The bulb wrappers are firm, tight and vivid with broad, bold purple stripes merging into areas of solid purple. A very strongly colored garlic. The clove covers are a silky golden tan with a rosy aura. It is one of the very first cultivars planted in the fall and the first harvested in the spring around here. The taste puts it in a class almost by itself.
When you first bite into a clove there is a beautiful musky garlic flavor that has just enough pungency (hotness) to let you know it is real garlic but not enough to be offensive so you settle back and enjoy the marvelous flavor. And after a minute or so, the rich garlickiness is replaced with a smooth warm aftertaste that just makes you feel good.
If you are looking for an early season garlic that harvests before any of the others and is great for raw eating and stores about six months from harvest at room temp., this one is for you.
Asiatic and Turban garlics are usually pretty hot but this one is for those who love garlic flavor but who don't want the hotness.
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Asiatic garlics typically have six to eight cloves per bulb in a circular configuration around a central scape. They're generally large bulbs with fat cloves. The bulb wrappers are firm, tight and vivid with broad, bold purple stripes merging into areas of solid purple. A very strongly colored garlic. The clove covers are silky and a lovely golden tan with a rosy aura and tiny pink veins. It is one of the very first cultivars planted in the fall and the first harvested in the spring around here. The taste puts it in a class almost by itself.
Typical of Asiatic garlics when bitten into raw, Japanese starts off rich with flavor but devoid of warmth, much less heat but after about 10 seconds a wave of warmth starts at the back of the mouth and spreads toward the front and intensifies as it comes on until it becomes very hot, levels off for about 30 seconds and gradually subsides into a mellow aftertaste that that makes you feel good inside and out and puts a warm smile on your face and a feeling of warm satisfaction in your soul.
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Korean Red - A rich yet mellow Asiatic Garlic.
Asiatic garlics typically have six to eight cloves per bulb in a circular configuration around a central scape. They're generally large bulbs with fat cloves. The bulb wrappers are firm, tight and vivid with broad, bold purple stripes merging into areas of solid purple. A very strongly colored garlic. The clove covers are silky and a lovely golden tan with a rosy aura and tiny pink veins. It is one of the very first cultivars planted in the fall and the first harvested in the spring around here. The taste puts it in a class almost by itself.
When you first bite into a clove there is a beautiful pure garlic flavor that is utterly devoid of heat, so you begin to settle back and enjoy the marvelous flavor while waiting for the hotness to sear your mouth any second but it never comes. And after a minute or so, the rich garlickiness is replaced with a smooth warm aftertaste that just makes you feel good.
If you are looking for an early season garlic that harvests before any of the others and is great for raw eating and stores about six months from harvest at room temp., this one is for you.
Asiatic and Turban garlics are usually pretty hot but this one is for those who love garlic flavor but who don't want the hotness.
Russian Redstreak, An Asiatic Garlic A rare early season mild garlic.
--Sorry folks, not available this year.--Russian Redstreak has evolved from a Rocambole garlic, Russian Red, according to Ron Engeland. If so, it is one of the few garlics that are related to Rocamboles that does well for us in our growing conditions. They tend to be streaked lightly with purple and are very early maturing garlics that must be pulled out of the ground before they get overly mature and split open the bulb wrappers. The Asiatic group still produce a seed stalk (scape) even though they're softnecks. They often have some large dark purple bulbils on their necks. These bulbils are truly beautifully colored. Failing to remove the scapes does not seem to harm bulb size very much. They are slightly smaller than Red Toch on the average and about the size of Chet's but with more color. They are supposed to be rather sharp tasting but they have been delightfully mild and full flavored with only a little heat for us in our climate.
They are a productive garlic, store very well, present a nice appearance and have an excellent raw flavor. If you want a very early maturing garlic that can be grown almost anywhere in the country and is a prolific reproducer, try a few of these jewels from Moscow.
Asian Rose - A strong
Asiatic Garlic.
Asiatic garlics typically have six to eight cloves per bulb in a circular configuration around a central scape. They're generally large bulbs with fat cloves. The bulb wrappers are firm, tight and vivid with broad, bold purple stripes merging into areas of solid purple. A very strongly colored garlic. The clove covers are silky and a lovely golden tan with a rosy aura and tiny pink veins. It is one of the very first cultivars planted in the fall and the first harvested in the spring around here. The taste puts it in a class almost by itself.
When you first bite into a clove there is a beautiful pure garlic flavor that is utterly devoid of heat, so you begin to settle back and enjoy the marvelous flavor and after six or eight seconds you can begin to feel a slight warmth in the back of your mouth and you start to say "Ah, there it is, I knew there had to be a little heat." Suddenly your entire mouth seems to explode in flames, your face turns red and you break out in an instant heavy sweat. The fire rages hotter and hotter for about 30 to 45 seconds and you begin to wonder what to do about it, then it begins to gently dissipate and is almost gone at the end of one minute leaving you to sit in your sweat and wonder whether you have the courage to take another bite any time soon. It took 30 to 45 minutes for the hair on the back of my neck to dry-just from a half of a clove. I have come to nick-name this cultivar the Chinese Time Bomb.
I no longer wonder where fire breathing dragons come from in Chinese folklore - they're ordinary people who have eaten too much of these Chinese garlics.
While it is not the hottest garlic I have ever tasted, it isn't any too far behind. In my limited experience, (I've only tasted 50 kinds) Metechi and Skuri #2 (Purple Stripes) are a little hotter and perhaps Wild Buff and Rosewood, too-both porcelains. If you want a powerful early harvesting garlic that will leave you breathless, or should I say breathful, try a few of these two Chinese firecrackers, they should have a very high allicin potential and be good medicinal or insecticide garlics-but make sure your fire insurance premiums are paid up first.
The Turban variety of Hardneck Garlics
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This Turban garlic originated in Turkmenistan, one of those small, mountainous Islamic republics near Chechnia that used to be in the Soviet Union. Not a particularly large garlic but a beautifully colorful one that harvests very early in the season. They form hardnecks and have lots of purple in rather flaky outer bulb wrappers that are easy to peel. The cloves are tannish with purple stripes on a purplish blush background and with slightly elongated tips. The bulbs contain an average of six cloves in a circular pattern and have no small internal cloves.
The taste is medium strong, leaning toward being bold,
but not overpowering. They have what seems to be a concentrated taste
with very good character that makes them very appealing to the tongue as well as the eye. They
are an attractive, early, tasty garlic that stores well but not real long
as they want to get back into the ground by October and tend to sprout in
the early fall.
Because this early season delight doesn't store past fall, it needs to be grown in conjunction with some longer
storing varieties like Porcelains or Creoles or Silverskins so as to insure having good garlic year around.
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Shilla is a very unusual garlic and surprising in several ways.
First, the bulb wrappers are very white background-most Asiatics and Turbans seem to have a lot of purple coloration.
Secondly, there is a strong tendency for these weakly bolting hardnecks to produce a scape and the bulbil capsule at the top of the scape
has a very definite turban shape to it. The clove covers are brownish-purple.
Shilla have a very strong garlicky flavor with a moderate heat. In addition to a nice garlickiness they have a distinct undertone
to them that strongly reminds of Dijon mustand, rather similar to Rose du Lautrec, a Creole garlic from the South of France.
They have a strong aftertaste that sticks around for a while. While they are certainly not the strongest garlic I have ever
tasted, their Dijon-like flavor makes them very unusual .
Asiatic and Turban garlics are always the first garlics we harvest each year as they mature weeks before any of the others.
They should be grown in conjunction with longer storing garlics like Porcelains or Silverskins since they harvest a month or two before them and provide garlic at a time of year when good garlic is very hard to find.
Another surprise is the bulbs, which are much larger than you would think as you look at the size of their foliage.
When you see them growing in the garden among other types of garlic, their leaves are not nearly as large as the others and you begin to think
they aren't going to form very big bulbs, but the bulbs turn out to be larger than you might think.
They store clean but they don't store as long as most other garlics as they seem to want to get back into the ground earlier in the fall since they
mature so early in the spring.
Shilla garlics average about eight big fat cloves per bulb in a rather circular configuration around a central core with no tiny interior cloves.
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Xian is a beautiful and mysterious garlic that everyone should grow if they can. First, their beauty makes you say "Wow" -
they are very white with radical red thick vertical stripes like a peppermint stick.
Now, the mystery, they were sent to Chester Aaron, author of "Garlic is Life" and many other works, from a woman from Chinatown in San Francisco and he has lost touch with her and doesn't know where they came from originally.
A beautifully colorful one that harvests very early in the season. most form hardnecks
and have lots of purple in rather flaky outer bulb wrappers that are easy
to peel. The cloves are tannish with purple stripes on a purplish blush
background and with slightly elongated tips. The bulbs contain an average
of six cloves in a circular pattern and have no small internal cloves.
The taste is medium strong, with a deep earthy muskiness and just enough pungency to let you know you're eating garlic but not enough to overwhelm.
Their rich flavor makes them very appealing to the tongue as well as the eye. They
are an attractive, early, tasty garlic that stores as well as any Asiatic or Turban
as they want to get back into the ground in October and tend to sprout in
the early fall.
Because this early season delight doesn't store past fall, it needs to be grown in conjunction with some longer
storing varieties like Porcelains or Creoles or Silverskins so as to insure having good garlic year around.
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otherwise the secure shopping cart will return you to our home page.
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Chinese Purple - A Turban Garlic
Chinese Purple is a very unusual garlic in several ways.
First, the bulb wrappers have vivid purple stripes on a very white background.
Secondly, there is a strong tendency for these softnecks
to produce a hardneck and the bulbil capsule at the top of the scape
has a very definite turban shape to it. Thirdly, the clove covers are
dark brownish-purple.
Chinese Purples have a very strong garlic taste with a fierce heat. I privately call them
Chinese cherry bombs as the heat is instantaneous and they seem to
explode in your mouth. They have a strong aftertaste that sticks around
for a while. While they are not the most powerful garlic I have ever
tasted, they are one potent package.
I perspired so much when I taste tested this one that it took 30 to 40 minutes for the hair on the back
of my neck to begin to dry out. If you like strong garlic, this is
one to get.
This would be an excellent garlic to use for the medicinal
benefits or if you want an extra strong garlic to use in insecticide
or anti-bacterial sprays as it would seem to have a very high potential
to produce lots of allicin. Asaiatics and Turbans are always the first garlics we harvest each year as they
the appear to mature before any of the others. Another surprise is
the bulbs are much larger than you would think as you look at the size of their foliage. When
you see them growing in the garden among other types of garlic, their
leaves are not nearly as large as the others and you begin to think
they aren't going to form very big bulbs, but the bulbs are surprisingly large.
They store clean but they don't store as long as most other artichokes as they seem
to want to get back into the ground earlier in the fall since they
mature so early in the spring. Our Chinese Purple garlics average about
12 cloves per bulb in a fairly circular configuration.
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[ Our Home Page ] [ Online Catalog ] [ Garlic Overview ] [ 40 Varieties ] [ Growing Garlic ] [ Cooking with Garlic ] [ Chemistry of Garlic ] [ Garlic Pills, Etc. ] [ Health Benefits ] [ Links ] [ FAQs ] [ About Us ] [ How to Order ]
[ Sampler Assortments ]
[ Pickle & Preserve Garlic ]
[ Artichoke (Softneck) Garlics ]
[ Asiatic Garlics ]
[ Creole Garlics ]
[ Porcelain Garlics ]
[ Purple Stripe Garlics ]
[ Rocambole Garlics ]
[ Silverskin (Softneck) Garlics ]
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