# the name of garlic pieces / whole garlics



## longxianchen

Hi,
Here is the picture of some garlic *segment*s(I'm not sure whether it's called segment)
How do you usually call it in English speaking  countries please?






Thank you in advance


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## Barque

A clove of garlic.


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## Cagey

I agree.  I call it a 'clove' of garlic.


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## longxianchen

What about "a piece of garlic" or "a garlic segment"?


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## Cagey

I wouldn't under stand 'piece of garlic' to mean segment. I would think it meant a cut piece of garlic. 

I would understand 'garlic segment', but I would think it an odd thing to say.


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## longxianchen

Thank you a lot. Now it's the last question perhaps. Can we say "now we put *this clove of garlic* into the hole and it will grow into a  *garlic plant*".
By the way, I'm making up an activity to help my kids to memorize vocabulary.


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## Cagey

You could.

I would probably talk about 'planting' a clove of garlic, but that's the topic for another thread.


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## Barque

_If we plant this clove in the ground, it will grow in to a garlic plant.
_
A _hole_ is a little vague, unless you specify a hole in the ground. 

Cross-posted.


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## shop-englishx

Hello,

Are these garlic cloves, garlic pieces, or something else? What's the specific name for these? (Look at the one that's on the right side of the image.)

Thanks.


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## owlman5

Hello.  The whole thing on the left is a garlic bulb.  The segments on the right are garlic cloves.  If you cut them into smaller pieces, I'd call them "pieces of garlic."


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## Glenfarclas

owlman5 said:


> The whole thing on the left is a garlic bulb.



More commonly called a *head of garlic*.


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## owlman5

Not among my neighbors and friends, Glen.  I doubt I've ever heard anybody call a bulb a "head" in my part of the world.  I must admit, however, that I don't know any foodies.  I'm prepared to believe that "head" may occur among people who need to talk about bulbs of garlic frequently.


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## You little ripper!

You hear both 'bulb' and 'head' in Australia.


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## Glenfarclas

I've _only_ called it a head.  Ngrams shows that "head of garlic" is more popular than "garlic bulb."


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## owlman5

I don't dispute what you call it, Glen.  I believe your remark about the Ngram, but I notice that "garlic bulb" does better than "garlic head" in the same corpus: garlic bulb/garlic head.


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## perpend

I dare say we need a botanist.

I understand it like owlman. The "unit" is a bulb, like a tulip / lily bulb". When you harvest, the units are "cloves". I suppose it could be regional.


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## Glenfarclas

owlman5 said:


> I don't dispute what you call it, Glen.  I believe your remark about the Ngram, but I notice that "garlic bulb" does better than "garlic head" in the same corpus: garlic bulb/garlic head.



That's true, but we don't generally say "garlic head," in the same way that you don't generally say "bulb of garlic."  (And in fact "garlic head" and "bulb of garlic" are almost evenly tied with each other.)


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## perpend

I don't know how you could even trust Ngram either which way.


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## suzi br

I  agree with owlman at post #2 on all three points.

I call the whole thing a bulb  and don't think I've ever noticed it being called a head in the UK.


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## velisarius

In recipes (from BA sources), they often talk about "heads" of garlic.

I've never called it a bulb of garlic - I only use "bulb" for light-bulbs  and decorative flowering plants. I wonder whether it's a regional difference, fashion, or personal preference. I must admit I haven't bought garlic or new recipe books in the UK for a good few years.


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## natkretep

_BBC Good Food_ refers to garlic bulbs:


> Part of the lily, or alium, family, of which onions are also a member, garlic is one of the most indispensible [sic] ingredients around, and plays a central role in Mediterranean and Asian cookery. A *bulb *composed of many individual cloves enclosed in a thin white, mauve or purple skin, it's quite fiery, pungent and crunchy when raw. (Source)





> The garlic *bulb *is the most commonly used portion of the plant, composed of 8-20 individual, teardrop shaped cloves enclosed in a white parchment-like skin. (Source)


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## velisarius

Yes nat, that's where I'd expect to see it called a "bulb" - in a botanical description, rather than in the shop or the kitchen.

Edit: I'd talk about "a garlic" or "a head of garlic" just to be more precise. One piece="a clove of garlic".


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## natkretep

I think the _BBC Good Food_ uses it in recipes too. Here's Roasties with Garlic and Chives.


> *Ingredients*
> 750g new potato
> a whole garlic bulb
> 50g softened butter
> [etc]





> *Method*
> Preheat the oven to 200C/ gas 6/fan 180C. Put the new potatoes in a small roasting tin. Break a whole garlic bulb into cloves and nestle them between the potatoes.


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## You little ripper!

How to Peel an Entire Bulb of Garlic Without Actually Peeling
_
To start, place the entire bulb under a bowl and then smash them. This will separate the cloves._

How To Peel A Whole Garlic Bulb Without Fingernails In Seconds

_Some people just go the supermarket to purchase the packaged peeled garlic but I prefer them fresh. With this super easy method, now you can peel your garlic quickly and with ease – an entire bulb or two at a time.
_
How to Peel Garlic > Start Cooking
_
A fresh bulb of garlic can be found in the produce section of the grocery store. It is very inexpensive. If it is stored in a cool dark place, it should last up to eight weeks.

This is a picture of whole bulbs of garlic.






It is made up of 10-16 cloves, and each clove is covered in a papery like skin._

Roast Potatoes and Carrots | Vegetables Recipes | Jamie Oliver Recipes

_Peel the vegetables and halve any larger ones lengthways. Break the garlic bulb into cloves, leaving them unpeeled, and bash them slightly with the palm of your hand. Pick the rosemary leaves from the woody stalks.
_


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## Keith Bradford

I'm happy with either _head_ or _bulb_, so long as there's plenty of it in the curry.  The main thing is to distinguish between the _head/bulb_ and the individual _cloves_.  If you don't, you risk getting 10-15 times too much or too little in your dish.


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## You little ripper!

Keith Bradford said:


> I'm happy with either _head_ or _bulb_, so long as there's plenty of it in the curry.


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## sound shift

Keith Bradford said:


> I'm happy with either _head_ or _bulb_, so long as there's plenty of it in the curry.  The main thing is to distinguish between the _head/bulb_ and the individual _cloves_.  If you don't, you risk getting 10-15 times too much or too little in your dish.


Yeah. If an apple a day keeps the doctor away, what does garlic do?* I say "head of garlic" for the whole thing, but food writersin the weekend papers may be to blame. More vigilance!

*(Answer: It keeps everyone away.)


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## Packard

I did some Internet research.  Garlic used for planting seems to be always called "bulbs".  

Garlic for eating seems to be bulbs more than heads but I did not do one of those ngrams.


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## GreenWhiteBlue

I suspect that it is a regional difference.  For what it's worth, I have never heard the term "head of garlic" before today; I have only known the undivided bunch of garlic cloves as a "bulb".


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## Cynthia M.

Yes, GreenWhiteBlue, it might be regional- I only use "head." But I think it's all right to use either, with "bulb" probably more suitable for botanical uses.


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## suzi br

velisarius said:


> In recipes (from BA sources), they often talk about "heads" of garlic.
> 
> I've never called it a bulb of garlic - I only use "bulb" for light-bulbs  and decorative flowering plants. I wonder whether it's a regional difference, fashion, or personal preference. I must admit I haven't bought garlic or new recipe books in the UK for a good few years.



Well that has surprised me! 
To be fair, not many recipes ask for a whole bulb of garlic, so you dont see either very often!


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## dermott

All very odd. I've never known it as anything other than a "head".


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## Keith Bradford

suzi br said:


> ... not many recipes ask for a whole bulb of garlic, so you dont see either very often!



Not in English cuisine, perhaps, but it's common in Indian cooking.  The first time I worked on a chicken recipe asking for *five bulbs* of garlic, I did wonder, and checked with several friends from that part of the world.  They just shrugged and said, "Yeah, why not?"  The resultant dish was as sweet as apple pie; long slow cooking is the secret.


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## dermott

There's also an Italian chicken dish that uses a similar number of *heads* of garlic. Long, slow cooking is certainly the secret. 

For what it's worth, the Italian word for the head/bulb translates as *head*.


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## Cynthia M.

In the English-speaking world, whole roasted garlic calls for one or more heads of garlic. And the word "head" is usually used, including on Martha Stewart's site:

Roasted Garlic


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## owlman5

Cynthia M. said:


> In the English-speaking world, whole roasted garlic calls for one or more heads of garlic.


Are you sure this statement applies to the entire 'English-speaking world', Cynthia?  I thought I was a member of that world, and I'd use 'bulb' rather than 'head' if I wanted to talk about roasting one of them.  There's always a danger of overstatement when you make sweeping statements about what hundreds of millions of people say.


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## suzi br

Cynthia M. said:


> In the English-speaking world, whole roasted garlic calls for one or more heads of garlic. And the word "head" is usually used, including on Martha Stewart's site:
> 
> Roasted Garlic



"Note" lots of other sites say bulb, including some that use both head and bulb in the same sentence, so I don't know what this link is supposed to show/add really?

x-posted with the wise owl


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## Glenfarclas

Apparently we've found a term on which there's a strongly marked difference, but it's _not_ an AE/BE divide, formal/colloquial, old-fashhioned/new-fangled, or any of the usual suspects; and people who use one term aren't even particularly aware that there _could_ be a different term for the same thing.  Very interesting.


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## Cynthia M.

owlman5 said:


> Are you sure this statement applies to the entire 'English-speaking world', Cynthia?



I was responding to those who (correctly) stated that whole heads/bulbs/whatever are more often used in foreign cuisines and this might be a reason the term is used less often in English, at least for culinary purpose. No, I do not presume to know the eating habits and linguistic usage of the entire Anglosphere, and didn't mean to imply so.


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## RM1(SS)

GreenWhiteBlue said:


> I suspect that it is a regional difference.  For what it's worth, I have never heard the term "head of garlic" before today; I have only known the undivided bunch of garlic cloves as a "bulb".


Ditto.

If you had asked me about "heads" of garlic, I would have assumed you meant the other end of the plant, as with tulips or daffodils.


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## JamesM

I've heard and used both 'head' and 'bulb'.  I never really thought about it.  I think my wife does, too.  "Pick up a head of garlic while you are at the supermarket."  That sounds normal to me, but so would "bulb".  No... now that I write it and read it, "Pick up a bulb of garlic at the supermarket" sounds a little odd.


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## cissy3

I can see that this could go on, and on!

I've only ever heard 'bulb' of garlic! But I'm not far from @suzi br  in England, so perhaps it is regional?


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## Loob

Wasn't this thread about what to call a "segment" of garlic?


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## cissy3




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## Cagey

Loob said:


> Wasn't this thread about what to call a "segment" of garlic?


It was.  You are correct, but I have just now changed the title to cover both topics, as they seem useful.


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## Cynthia M.

This does indeed have the potential to go on indefinitely.  I found an interesting thread on head vs bulb of garlic, featuring NGrams of American and British use of the two over the decades. There was a net prevalence of "head of garlic" in both AE and BE, but patterns changed rather bizarrely over the years.

What do you call a bunch of garlic (when you don't remove the cloves)?


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## natkretep

I don't think the picture is clear. The Ngram chart shows figures for 'head of garlic' and 'bulb of garlic', but not 'garlic bulb' or 'garlic head'. If you look at the graph here that contains both, everything appears more neck-to-neck neck and neck*: we are more likely to say 'head of garlic' than 'garlic head', but we are more likely to say 'garlic bulb' than 'bulb of garlic'.

*Sorry, I did mean 'neck and neck'.


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## Glenfarclas

Well, I am a proud headite, so _I_ think the Ngrams support headism.  Fie, ye bulbites, fie!


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## Cynthia M.

natkretep said:


> everything appears more neck-to-neck



everything appears more *neck and neck. *[starts new thread]


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## velisarius

Hmm - the Ngrams seem to indicate that the heads have it, especially considering that written sources with "bulb" are likely to include a number of botanical descriptions of the "garlic bulb" that don't concern us here.

If this is developing into an "another think/thing coming" controversy, it might be a good idea for "bulbers/bulbites" and "headers" alike to eat a few cloves of garlic (lowers the blood pressure, I believe).


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## perpend

Glenfarclas said:


> Well, I am a proud headite, so _I_ think the Ngrams support headism.  Fie, ye bulbites, fie!


The bulbites may bring you to your senses, Glen. Sometimes it takes a few seasons.


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## suzi br

velisarius said:


> Hmm - the Ngrams seem to indicate that the heads have it, especially considering that written sources with "bulb" are likely to include a number of botanical descriptions of the "garlic bulb" that don't concern us here.
> 
> If this is developing into an "another think/thing coming" controversy, it might be a good idea for "bulbers/bulbites" and "headers" alike to eat a few cloves of garlic (lowers the blood pressure, I believe).



So true  

Are we all agreed on clove as the segments?


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## dermott

suzi br said:


> So true
> 
> Are we all agreed on clove as the segments?



I wouldn't go there, suzi.


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## You little ripper!

suzi br said:


> Are we all agreed on clove as the segments?


No, suzi, I'm going to be contrary (call me 'Mary') and call them 'bulblets'! 

Bulblet - definition of bulblet by The Free Dictionary

_*1. * A small bulb, especially one attached to a mature bulb or an underground stem._

_Garlic clove - definition of garlic clove by The Free Dictionary

*1. garlic clove* - one of the small bulblets that can be split off of the axis of a larger garlic bulb_


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