Big Stone Garlic

Family Farmed Garlic

Garlic News

The 2022 Minnesota Garlic Festival is Almost Here!

We know what you’re thinking…there’s really a whole festival about garlic?! Well, guess what? There is, and we think you’ll enjoy it a lot! Now in its 15th year, the Minnesota Garlic Festival is sponsored by the Sustainable Farming Association, and it features food, fun, entertainment, and of course, a lot of garlic! The main attraction is the 15 Upper Midwest garlic growers (including Big Stone Garlic), but that’s not the only thing you’ll find at the festival. You can experience live music, find great food and drinks, browse the shops of local artisans, watch knowledgeable chefs demonstrate mouthwatering garlic dishes, make kites, and even taste garlic ice cream! (We’ve tried it, and some of us say it’s great!). Whatever you may think about garlic ice cream, though, you’re sure to find something to your taste at the festival. Located at the McLeod County Fairgrounds in Hutchinson, MN, the Garlic Festival lasts one day only, so make sure you come early enough on Saturday, August 13th to discover all it has to offer! And, while you’re there, come visit us at the Big Stone Garlic booth in the vendors’ building; we’d love to talk with you! For more information, visit the official Minnesota Garlic Festival website at https://www.mngarlicfest.com/.

Quick Event Information:

When: Saturday, August 13th, 2022, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Where: McLeod County Fairgrounds, 840 Century Ave SW, Hutchinson, MN 55350

2021 garlic orders are heading out!

You know it’s August when you can start ordering garlic! Big Stone Garlic is ready to fill orders for Chesnok Red, German Red, Inchelium, Belarus, and Variety Packs. In fact, we sent our first orders out last week. Visit our store for more details.

Please note: Because of the extremely hot and dry growing season here in western Minnesota, some varieties will be smaller than normal this year, particularly our Belarus variety. Also, due to the dry weather, the garlic bulbs haven’t produced as many layers of protective skin as usual. In order to preserve the garlic for you to enjoy, we’ve left as many skins on as possible, so you may notice some residual soil on your order.

A Crash Course on Scapes

picking scapes

All over the garlic fields, curly, corkscrewing stalks are popping up on our plants. Some grow in arcs, others in double loops, and when they’re snapped, you can smell them from the end of the row. But what exactly are they? Good question! These stalks are called “scapes”, and they’re a part of garlic that most people have never heard of.
Scapes are the stems of the garlic flower, and if left unpicked, they’ll form delicate purple flowers around harvest time. Unfortunately for the grower, producing this flower takes up most of the garlic plant’s energy, so the garlic bulbs stay smaller and less developed. Small garlic? Who wants that? Not us, so we head out to our fields a few times a week to harvest the scapes.

Snapping off the scape reverts the plant’s energy back to the bulb, and we end up with some tasty treats in the process. Scapes are edible, with a strong garlic flavor that works nicely in anything from pesto to omelettes to pickles!
Try some of our favorite recipes here:

Garlic Scape Pesto

Marinated Garlic Scapes and Asparagus

Roasted Garlic Scapes and Asparagus

Sadly, we haven’t been able to find a viable method of shipping to keep scapes fresh during transit, so we will not be offering them for sale this year.

Week One of the Backhaul Project

Last week we shipped more garlic as part of UofM Extension’s Backhaul Project than we thought we’d ever see leave our farm at one time. Here is an update one week later.

Local garlic from Big Stone Garlic traveled from the farm in Correll, MN to Bonnie’s Hometown Grocery in Clinton, MN (yellow)- where it was loaded on a truck and backhauled to Mason Brothers Grocery Wholesale, and transferred to Russ Davis Produce Wholesale (orange). Grocery stores around the region ordered the garlic – here are the shelves where it can be  found after week one!

We expect the store locations to multiply, and we are pleased with the initial response – the model worked and got the local garlic out to the stores through backhauling. – Ren Olive, Program Associate, Sustainable Development Partnerships | U of Minnesota Extension

Downloadable List of Retail Stores Selling BSG – Week One (pdf)map showing grocery stores that carry BSG garlic