“With three nickels you’ll be on the subway, but garlic will give you a seat.” ~ Old New York saying.

Have you ever been curious as to why garlic smells like this? Well, wonder no more. Read on about this friendly and versatile member of the lily family and find out how he came to be on everyone’s breath everywhere you think to look.

If the body movements denote its own language and a picture is worth a thousand words, how many smells make up a sentence? It depends on the sentence, you could say. Well that’s true. “Jack and Jill went up the hill” is not the same with our nostrils like: “The garlic in Grandma’s carbonara floated into the dining room, making our mouths water.” “Smells by any other name are still smells,” as one of my neighbors who was never without her gas mask used to say. Certainly, within the animal kingdom, smells understood their own form of communication. My argument is that garlic does too; Because no matter what country you call home and no matter what language your mother tongue is, the cuisine of almost every culture recognizes and uses garlic in one form or another. In that sense, it is a second language for all who cross its wonderful, smelly path.

A man named Arthur Baer once said that there is no such thing as a little garlic. Whether this is due to its magical culinary power or because there can never be enough protection against the vampires hanging around the house is a matter of opinion. The superstition of garlic as a deterrent against evil and vampires is deeply ingrained in Balkan folklore. The legend of the vampires is based in part on a true homicidal maniac; Vlad Tepes Dracula, whose name means devil in Romanian. In the 15th century, he ruled Walaachia, which is now part of Romania, as Vlad II and was affectionately known as Vlad the Impaler by his closest friends and foes. (He didn’t have many of them when his reign ended due to his bloodthirsty predilections.) Bram Stoker and later Hollywood idealized the vampire, transforming him into a tragic, erotic, and lonely figure, seeking out beautiful damsels to free him from his curse and join him in an eternal game of chess within the chambers of his dark and drafty. Transylvanian castle air.

The word vampire comes from the Slavic word obyri or obiri, which evolved into the Bulgarian word vampir. Some say that the Greek word, nosphorosos, which means plague bearer, which evolved into the old Slavic word nosferatu is synonymous with vampire. In our culture, words are often exchanged. Many of the early myths grouped vampires, witches, and werewolves. It was thought that a vampire could transform into a wolf. This happened when the bat form was not available and Bela Lugosi was working on another movie. The vampire would enter the house of the unwary and drink the blood of his children. To protect themselves, common people sprinkled salt or seeds around their doors and hung garlic cloves on their windows. The vampire was thought to be a compulsive accountant and would have to know exactly how many grains of salt or seeds there were before he could enter the house. (This can also be seen as the beginning of OCD, obsessive compulsive disorder, which will be the subject of another article, hitting local theaters soon.)

Protecting vampires throughout the misty forests of Transylvania probably isn’t one of your biggest garlic concerns today. (But again, who knows?) Garlic has its own history and its own language. Although it is not known with certainty when it was discovered, it is likely that nomads first dispersed it in the steppes of Central Asia several thousand years ago. Already in the VIII century a. C., garlic grew in the garden of Babylon. Chinese scholars spoke of him from 3000 BC. C. and there is also a reference in the Shih Ching (the book of songs), a collection of ballads said to have been written by Confucius himself. Garlic was so prized in ceremonies and rituals that lambs offered for sacrifice in China were seasoned with it to make them more palatable to the gods.

Garlic was part of the Sumerian diet in the Middle East more than 5,000 years ago. By 1000 AD, it was cultivated throughout the known world and universally recognized as a valuable plant. It was introduced to France by Godefroy de Bouillon, not the inventor of the bouillon cube, but the leader of the First Crusade, who when he returned to France in 1099, was declared King of Jerusalem. Many cultures elevated garlic beyond a staple food and suggested that it had medicinal and spiritual purposes. In ancient Greece, Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, used it to treat infections, wounds, and intestinal disorders. Roman legionnaires attributed their courage and endurance to garlic and took it away while conquering the world, thus spreading its use and cultivation like bad rumors everywhere.

The ancient Egyptians worshiped garlic as a god, and his name was often invoked in oaths. (It is not known whether those who swore first rinsed themselves with mouthwash out of respect for the nostrils of the gods.) During the era of the great pharaohs of Egypt, according to ancient papyri, garlic served as food, medicine, and offering. It was found in the tomb of Tutankamen and within the Saqqarah funerary complex, as well as in inscriptions on the Giza pyramid. Garlic was so valuable that 15 pounds would buy a healthy slave. It is also written that the workers building the pyramids were given garlic (as well as onions and radishes) every day to help increase their vitality. It was so important to their diets that it caused work stoppages when workers were deprived of their allotted ration. According to Charmidas, unfaithful Egyptian husbands relied on garlic’s unique “perfumed” properties to hide evidence of infidelity. They would chew a tooth or two on the way home after visiting their lovers so that their entire body was infused with the scent, ensuring that a jealous wife could not detect another woman’s perfume.

Garlic, known by its Latin name, Allium sativum, may very well be one of Mother Nature’s greatest gifts to man (and woman, of course). It is a powerful natural antibiotic. It lowers blood pressure in hypertension and is helpful in reducing “bad cholesterol.” An advantage of using garlic for its antibiotic properties is that it does not destroy the body’s natural gut bacteria. It is excellent for use on colds and infections. Garlic oil is often used to treat earaches and ear infections, especially in babies and children. During World War I, garlic was used as a wound dressing in the field and as an antiseptic. It has also been shown to be an effective treatment for fungal infections, such as athlete’s foot. The active ingredient in garlic, allicin, is destroyed when heated and is only released from the tooth when it is crushed or bruised. Therefore, for most treatments, the garlic must be crushed or raw. (Stay away. This means you!)

Garlic has other uses as well. Peeled nails that are placed in a room are said to prevent disease. The entire bulb is hung in new homes to dispel negativity and evil spirits. A nail placed under the pillow of sleeping children is said to protect them. Dreaming of eating garlic means that you will discover secrets. (Perhaps now you will find out who your baby’s mother really is!) It is mentioned in the Bible that the Hebrews used garlic to increase and maintain virility. Early travelers through the Rocky Mountains inserted garlic into the nostrils of their horses and mules to prevent them from collapsing due to lack of oxygen. Mountain explorers in South America chewed wild garlic to alleviate altitude sickness. Native American tribes treated many ailments with wild garlic, although they were defenseless against the forces of Manifest Destiny and the eventual disappearance of their garlic birthright.

For culinary purposes, a rule of thumb to remember regarding the potency of garlic is: the smaller you cut it, the stronger the flavor. A finely chopped or pressed raw clove releases more flavor than a dozen whole cooked cloves. Finely chopping and / or pressing a tooth exposes more surfaces to the air, causing a chemical reaction that produces that strong aroma. When cloves are cooked or baked whole, the flavor softens to a sweet, almost nutty flavor, which is a surprisingly pleasant addition to desserts, such as ice cream or brownies. Whole, unperforated cloves have hardly any aroma, while raw garlic is the strongest in flavor. When sautéing, be very careful not to burn it. If you do, the taste will turn intensely bitter and you will have to start over.

And now the problem that we have all been waiting with bated breath (or at least something wrong). Why does garlic smell like this? When cells are broken by cutting or pressing, they release an enzyme called alinacea that chemically changes the allin inherent in allicin, a sulfur-containing molecule, resulting in that spicy mainstay found in kitchens around the world. If you are a garlic lover, you may want to surround yourself with other people who enjoy it too, or try chewing parsley to get rid of garlic breath. (As far as I know, there is no cure for parsley breath!) It is said that to get rid of hand odor after peeling or mincing garlic, simply wash your hands and then scrub them with a chrome tap. (I don’t know. That’s what they say).

There are many different types of garlic (Allium). Although only the cultivated variety is used for medicinal purposes, all other species have similar properties to a greater or lesser degree. Raven garlic is widely distributed and quite common, but the bulbs are very small and the work of digging them up is excellent. It is frequently found in pastures and affects the taste of milk when cows eat it. Ranson garlic grows in the forest and has a very pungent taste and smell. It also has small bulbs, which makes it impractical. However, it is quite a beautiful plant with broad leaves that resemble lily of the valley and star-shaped flowers that are dazzling white. Field garlic is quite a rare plant. Both this and the Crow Garlic are often used as herbs or for flavoring. There are some species of Allium grown in the garden, whose flowers are even sweet smelling, but they are exceptions and even these have the smell of garlic in their leaves and roots.

All in all, I would say that garlic is good business. I even like the smell and am considering marketing it as a perfume. (I had the same idea of ​​manure for horse lovers. That didn’t work but …) In her own way, Bela Lugosi lives in the soul of every garlic dish; not like a vampire, but more like a dinner guest who avoids daylight and mirrors and tastes good food when he sees it. If you come across him amongst the hazy ghosts of Hollywood celluloid, say hi to him, because I’m a fan. But just in case, try some Vampire Away Garlic Dip provided by The Snack food Association and included at the end of this article. It’s creepy and frighteningly good with fluted or regular fries for all who dare eat it. Add some extra cloves just in case. After all, you never know who you might run into in the Hollywood of your mind.

Garlic dip for vampires

1/2 cup of skim milk

1 cup low-fat cottage cheese

2 small garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoons of chopped parsley

2 tablespoons chopped chives

1/8 teaspoon of paprika

1/8 teaspoon curry powder

1 teaspoon onion salt

Addresses:

Go to the nearest cemetery after midnight on a cold October night. Blend all the ingredients in the blender until smooth. Then wait and see what happens. If nothing works, go home and enjoy your dip because it worked!