family Heirlooms

LAST YEAR, NAT BRADFORD found a bulbing allium growing in a patch of woods on his farm in Sumter, South Carolina. Because I organize the Western North Carolina Garlic Festival, Nat emailed me with the inquiry, “Could this be a landrace garlic?” I decided to sleep on it, and didn’t reply straight away.

The next morning I had a Facebook message, a text message, an email, and a missed phone call, all about the garlic. Nat had already shipped samples to a collection of well-known chefs, taken various photos, and transplanted some of the bulbs into pots. Within the week, I received my own zip-close bag containing an uprooted garlic-esque plant. I’m pretty sure the allium is a naturalized elephant garlic that didn’t get very big —