New Year

Resolutions
Garlic breath, Swedes and Latin

The new year has dawned (well a couple of weeks ago now), and to be quite honest the new day had nearly dawned by the time I wobbled my way home after the evenings merry making. The after effects of this all but compulsory excess were slow to clear the next day. Technically it was the same day but my days are governed more by bed than clock. It was this self inflicted suffering that prompted a couple of New Years resolutions..

Number 1. I will not open more than one bottle of wine per day (unless I am sharing).

Number 2. I will only drink whisky on days that end in a 'y'.

Now I appreciate that the more cynical of you out there may think these resolutions are not too arduous but I'm a firm believer that resolution are more likely to be kept if the bar is not set too high.

My third resolution is not alcohol related but I suspect is going to be the hardest to keep!

I have a friend who says every time we meet that I smell of garlic. In fact I may be mistaken but the last time she introduced me to one of her other friends I'm sure she said "This is Brian, he always smells of garlic". I'm not sure if this was a criticism, apology or simply a warning. Either way with this in mind I have decided to cut back on my consumption of this lovely, lovely, fragrant little bulb.

Garlic, or as Carl von Linné classified and named it Allium sativum is a plant with a tremendous history and a reputation for having incredible health giving properties. Unfortunately it does have one or two little downsides. The better know of these downsides as I'm sure my friend can attest to is its ability to produce that particular form of halitosis that goes by the common name of 'Garlic Breath'. I don't think Carl von' classified that and gave it a Latin label, but then if you eat Surströmming I suspect garlic breath is a minor problem.

Carlvon Linné by the way, in case you missed that particular lesson, was the Swedish botanist who came up with the idea of classifying all living organisms and giving them Latin names. Indeed he was so obsessed with giving things Latin names that he Latinized his own name to Carolus Linnaeus. And I bet you thought all Swedes were boring. I for one am a big fan of all things Swedish - Wallander, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Bridge, the root vegetable that Carl von would have called Brassica napobrassica and of course the Muppet Chef, although why Swedes insist on having their doors open the wrong way is a mystery to me.

The word garlic comes from the old English 'garleac' meaning spear leek but it is actually a native of Central Asia and has a history that goes back some 6000 years. For many of those years it has been a staple in the Mediterranean region, as well as a frequent seasoning in Asia, Africa, and Europe. America however was a late adopter of this pungent bulb and it was shunned by our cousins over the pond until the first quarter of the last century. Indeed American diner slang of the 1920's referred to garlic as 'Bronx vanilla' or 'Italian perfume'. Apparently Gary a town in Indiana passed a law, and possibly still has a law making it 'illegal to eat garlic and go to a 'movie house', theatre or ride on a public street-car within four hours of eating said garlic', although to be fair even in England it was declared wrongful for proper ladies to consume garlic, but that was in the 17th century.

For much of its history garlic has also been known as 'the stinking rose'. The stinking part is understandable I suppose, although a little harsh in my opinion. The rose part is a little more difficult as garlic is most defiantly a member of the onion family and most defiantly not a rose. The only explanation I could find for the comparing of garlic to a rose was that if looked at from underneath, a bulb of garlic resembles a white rose with the large ends of the cloves forming the petals. This rather stretches even my abstract imagination.

Since the time of King Tut some 1300 years BC (I use the term BC in preference to the latest more politically correct term BCE – Before Common Era! What nonsense - Look up the definition of BCE and it says 'This abbreviation has come to replace the previously used B.C. ("before Christ"), and covers the period of history prior to (before) the birth of Christ'. Durrrr!!!!

But before I fly off at a tangent and start ranting, back to our garlic and the time of King Tut.

Since the time of King Tut and possibly many, many years before the reign of the boy king, garlic was accredited with several healing, health giving, stimulating and protective properties. Garlic was fed to the Pyramid building slaves to ward off illness and to increase strength and endurance. Koreans of old apparently ate garlic before travelling mountain paths to help protect them from tiger attack. Greek soldiers ate garlic before going into battle as did the Romans believing it would inspire them and give them courage. Even as recently as World War 1, the Russian army used garlic to treat wounds incurred by soldiers on the Front Line. The Red Army physicians relied so heavily on garlic that it became known as the "Russian Penicillin". Even today, garlic is used by herbalists for a wide variety of illnesses including high cholesterol, colds, flu, coughs, bronchitis, fever, ring and intestinal worms, liver, gallbladder, and digestive problems. Over the last few years several scientific papers have been published which strongly indicate that garlic may be highly efficient in preventing heart disease and high blood pressure, although I can find no record of any scientific study into garlic's most well known protective property.

But fear not, I have first hand anecdotal evidence to share with you in that matter.

The reputation of garlic as a vampire repellent goes back long before Bram Stoker's character van Helsing used it to protect Lucy in the classic Gothic novel Dracula, but as far as I know it's effectiveness has never been scientifically tested. What I can tell you is as a long standing prolific garlic muncher I have never had a vampire confrontation, indeed it is many years, if not decades since anyone, living or dead has even tried to bite my neck!

But we digress or at least I do. What causes garlic breath and how can it be countered?

Allyl mercaptan, diallyl disulphide, methyl mercaptan and allyl methyl sulphide along with various other sulphur compounds are the bad boys of garlic and are apparently responsible for that whiffy breath and no I haven't just made those names up. These compounds are produced when the allicin in garlic is broken down in the body, and or, by chopping, slicing and crushing cloves when preparing food. Allyl methyl sulphide is a particularly bad boy as it only breaks down slowly in the body resulting in an odour that lasts and lasts. It is also the only compound detectable in urine. I don't recollect ever having 'garlic wee' although I had a bit of scare a few days ago after an excess of roasted beetroot.

It seems then that keeping the garlic cloves whole can only be a good thing with regards to the garlic breath issue. In fact my favourite pork ragu recipe starts by flavouring the olive oil by halving garlic cloves (so you can remove the little green bit) and heating gently in the oil until golden brown before removing and discarding them. This is similar to the technique used in almost every dish in a rather nice Italian recipe book, the name of which escapes me at the moment, but which I picked up at the library recently.

On the same lines the mellowness of whole roasted garlic bulbs and individual cloves with skin still on cannot be denied. Unfortunately for those sauces and sides that use raw garlic it seems the only option is to use less, a lot less, than is given in the recipe but perhaps it is worth remembering the words of Arthur Baer "There is no such thing as a little garlic".

Once afflicted by garlic breath there are a few things that are claimed to reduce the effect although none even come close to claiming to eradicate it altogether. The two most acceptable of these are probably, chewing parsley or drinking full fat milk, but, for me neither of these really challenge coffee, mint and Gaviscon as a way to round off a meal.

Well I've just noticed that today is one of those days that end in a 'y', so I think a small glass of whisky is not out of order...