A garlic gathering expedition gone sour

One of the triumphs of my so far rather dramatic and varied motherhood experience is that The Booba loves garlic. I mean he LOVES garlic. The other day when we went out for some Indian food I found myself fighting him for my seriously potent garlic naan bread. This is convenient as its a staple ingredient around here. So we go through a fair bit of it. I didn't really used to think too much about where the garlic we bought was coming from until I got into this local eating lark and started reading labels - did you realise that most of the garlic in the local supermarket is imported from China? And - scarier - that all imported garlic is routinely sprayed with methyl bromide? This is a nasty little number that has the temerity not only to be toxic to the ozone layer but also to the human body - trust me, Google it if you feel like a bit a fright. This is definately not something that you want anywhere near you, let alone in your food.

So for these reasons I usually buy Australian grown garlic, even though its about a gazillion times more expensive than its cousins from far flung shores. The other day I was thrown into a bit of a panic when I found the household garlic holding receptacle empty. So I trundled The Booba in his chariot down to the local supermarket where I was a little taken aback to find I had the choice of Chinese or Spanish garlic and nothing Australian grown. I took the ill advised step of asking the vegetable shelf stockist man about it, only to be treated to a long winded rant which started off with some fairly reasonable commiseration but ended with some borderline racist and kind of bonkers comments about Chinese market gardeners that had me backing away and nodding with a nervous smile on my face. But he could offer me some useful insight into the Australian garlic situation - the reason why there is a paucity of it and why its so crazily expensive is that apparently its so labour intensive to grow that not many around here can be bothered. So I'm going to be bothered. I'm ordering my own garlic heads from the Diggers Club tonight with the intention of trying to grow my own in pots. I'll keep you posted.