Inside a 10-by-10-foot corner of a Mattituck barn, more than 2,200 freshly harvested garlic bulbs hang drying from twine stretched across the ceiling. For 23-year-old Chris Romano, they’re proof that his gamble on building the North Fork Garlic Company from scratch is beginning to take root.

Four floor fans hum continuously beneath the rows of specialty hardneck garlic, helping cure bulbs whose origins trace thousands of miles from the North Fork. Romano’s harvest includes five varieties descended from garlic native to Russia and the Republic of Georgia, regions whose cold climates, he said, resemble the growing conditions on Long Island’s East End.

It took Romano two years to prepare the two-acre Southold field he leases before he planted a single clove. He grew nearly 6-foot-tall mustard, ryegrass and buckwheat as cover crops, then plowed and mulched them back into the soil. The former potato field also needed lime to raise the pH level to about 6.6 before it was ready for garlic.

Romano, who works as vineyard manager at Duck Walk and Pindar Vineyards, launched North Fork Garlic Company two years ago with an eye toward growing something few commercial farms on Long Island produce. Unlike the softneck garlic commonly found in supermarkets — much of it grown in California or imported from China — he specializes in hardneck varieties prized for their larger cloves, complex flavors and ability to thrive in colder climates.

Garlic drying in the barn and garlic scapes Credit: Deborah Wetzel

Springtime ‘pop up’

Romano’s love of garlic started while he was growing up in Nassau County. His mom always grew it in her garden, and he sees it as a very unique crop. “I think it’s cool that you plant it in the fall, it sleeps during the winter and it’s among the first things to pop up in the spring.” And after attending Plant Science Day at the Cornell Cooperative Extension, he thought, why not try to grow it himself on a small farm?

After his successful harvest this year, he is excited about trying to find “really wonky ones, garlic with lots of colors. Not enough people play around with the specialty stuff.” His harvest this year consisted of five unique types: Music garlic with a medium-hot flavor, the high-yielding German White, a large-cloved variety with a strong garlic flavor, Chesnok Red with its thin pinkish-red cloves preferred for baking, Georgian Crystal, which has a rich savory flavor, and the large, dark purple Bavarian garlic, which is mildly hot in taste.

The latter two won’t be replanted, he said, because they didn’t produce a vigorous yield. Instead, he plans to introduce two new varieties — Krasnodar, a nutty-flavored purple-striped garlic originally from Russia, and Georgian Fire, which according to Romano is “one of the garlickiest garlics in the world,” and originates from the Cichisdzhvari region of Georgia.

‘Baby’ garlic

Characteristics of hardneck garlic are its thick stem, porcelain-like skin, four to six larger cloves and a scape, the plant’s bulbous seed pod. In his hands was a batch of scapes — scallion-like, bright green threads encasing a small clove — Romano said they could be called baby garlic. “I throw them on a grill with a little bit of olive oil and they are delicious.” He also offers them free at his Cutchogue farm stand, as they sit in a cooler of cold water.

In growing these unique varieties, Romano said he’s also trying to teach people about garlic. “Before I grew it, I didn’t know the difference between the stuff that California and China grow. Hardneck garlic isn’t really commercially available.” He explained that every year that he reuses his bulbs, they become acclimated to the climate here and the yield increases. “It becomes a real North Fork crop.”

He also has experimented with the machinery needed to produce the garlic. Giving an old, bare-bones bicycle a new function, he fashioned it into a hole digger by installing 2-inch dibblers — tiny metal cores with pointed ends — that, when pushed through the field, dig holes in the dirt. When Romano is pushing his newfangled farm equipment from behind, he drops a bulb into the hole. “It’s a lot of work, but it’s fun.”

A ‘side hustle’

Romano shoulders most of the labor on his crop; he finds time for his side agricultural hustle when he’s not working as the vineyard manager at Duck Walk and Pindar Vineyards. But he does have a few paid helpers and his family and girlfriend volunteer their time. Much of their work is what most gardeners dread: weeding. “We’re not certified organic, but there’s no pesticides or herbicides and only organic fertilizer. That’s the price you pay, the trade-off for doing it organically — a lot of hand weeding.”

Romano rolling a hole-digger he fashioned out of an old bicycle

Along with adding to his viticulturist skills, the garlic farmer, who started as an intern at Pindar after graduating from SUNY Cobleskill, Romano said he wanted to stay on Long Island and farm here because his family lives here. “I go into the East Meadow farmers market at Eisenhower Park on Saturdays, sell my garlic and see my parents.” He also sells wholesale to supermarkets, local restaurants and neighboring farm stands.

A few miles east on Bridge Lane just off Sound Avenue sits Romano’s quaint farm stand, offering garlic in bunches alongside freshly cut mini-bouquets of zinnias. He charges $3 for one jumbo clove and $6 for three smaller ones. “Compared to growing grapes, garlic is easier,” he chuckled.

More information can be found on Romano’s Facebook page.