That's right, Gilroy, the garlic capital of the world now has less garlic. A shame really. The biggest grower used to have 40 acres of the stuff. I live in the next town to the north and even way up here we can often smell the stuff. I did notice that there was less of a smell this year.
That fella with the 40 acres? Well, urban sprawl has made it more profitable for him to sell that land off to developers who will build homes that (in todays market) are not too likely to sell for a really long time. Right now, he only has 10 acres of land left growing garlic.
So where is all the garlic coming from? The demand is still there, so you can't just stop growing the stuff. Much of the new growing area has moved to the the San Joaquin Valley. But even more shocking is that a whole lot of that garlic growing has been moved to ... China! Being one of those folks that likes to avoid buying anything made in China - that bit of news hits me where it hurts.
So this years Garlic Festival (which ended today), was less garlic'y than usual. I did not go this year... I mean really... how many times can eating garlic ice cream be fun? But I was down that way during the festivities and you could barely smell the stuff.
Another era comes to an end.
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