Supercharge your Garlic by fermenting it.

Fermenting some of your Garlic crop can boost its benefits.


Garlic is well known, perhaps even legendary, for its medicinal properties and is a go-to for many people when they experience the first sign of a cold or flu. There is a way to give it a further boost and that is through fermenting it.

Fermented Garlic (also known as Black Garlic, though I can never get mine to go black) adds the benefits of probiotics from the fermentation process while reducing the strength of the taste and smell of garlic on your breath.

As the fermentation process progresses, chemicals in the Garlic such as it’s key component, Allicin, are converted to antioxidants. There could be a slight reduction in the antibacterial effects due to the reduction of the amount of Allicin but Garlic’s chock full of the stuff so I don’t think the trade off for health giving antioxidants is too bad. Fermentation also improves the availability of minerals in the Garlic, meaning that they are absorbed more easily.

How to ferment your Garlic –

Fermenting Garlic can be done in two ways. One is the classic lacto-ferment with a water and salt brine and the other is to ferment the cloves in honey.

Lacto ferment method –

All you need to lacto-fermemt your Garlic is some brine. That is, non-iodised salt and water.


Just Garlic,salt and water.


There’s a few ideas on how strong to make the brine but I find that dissolving enough salt in clean water to give the water a distinctly salty taste is enough. You don’t need too much salt and, maybe you even have your favourite brine recipe already from your other kitchen ferments.

Peel enough cloves to loosley fill whatever container you are using and add your cooled brine. Leave a bit of a gap above the brine level and make sure your Garlic cloves are submerged.

Turn your jar upside down to mix everything and make sure that the cloves get exposed to the fermenting bacteria. Flip it back after a couple of days.


Turn the jar upside down to help clear air bubbles.


Put your jar in a warm place, out of direct sunlight and wait for a couple of days. You should see bubbles form on the Garlic. They’re carbon dioxide from the fermentation and shows that the fermentation is working.


Soon enough, you'll see lots of bubbles forming.


Don’t panic if, during the fermentation process, you see your cloves turn green, blue or even black. That’s normal and is due to a shift in the pH of the brine. It’s just an indication that some of the compounds in the cloves are being converted into different but just as good stuff during the ferment.


Don't worry if the Garlic in your ferment turns green. It's normal.


Depending on the time of year, it should take 3-4 weeks to ferment. You can even leave it longer.

As I mentioned before, the fermentation process does produce carbon dioxide and pressure will build up in your jar – quite a bit of it. It can even buckle the lid on a Mason Jar!


Make sure you 'burp' your container occasionally or things like this can happen.


To alleviate the pressure in the jar, all you have to do is to ‘burp’ the jar every few days. This means that you lift the lid a little to let the gas escape and reduce the pressure. You can also invest in an airlock if you’re planning to do a lot of fermentation. These let gas out while preventing oxygen from making its way in.

Fermenting Garlic in honey.

This is pretty simple too. Just put your peeled cloves loosely into a jar and fill the rest of the space with honey. Leave a little gap at the top of the jar.

The process is the same as the brine ferment. You’ll see the honey become more liquid and bubbles form Just treat it the same as the brine method.

How to use your finished ferment –

You can use the cloves from both methods as you would use garlic cloves normally in your cooking. Even eating them straight is possible now that the taste and odour have been reduced.Some cloves may even taste sweet!

The honey from the honey ferment method is now supercharged with Garlicky goodness and is now an even better cure-all than it was before, especially for sore throat, colds, flus.

A clove a day is all you need to help with most ailments. Use the honey by the spoonful, just as you would regular honey.

If you keep the brine from the lacto-ferment method, you can use it as a mouthwash and gargle for any mouth or upper respiratory ailment you may have.

A few warnings:

Fermented Garlic doesn’t appear to have major side effects, but like regular, unfermented Garlic, you should avoid it in large amounts if you take blood-thinning medications (such as Aspirin or Warfarin) or are allergic to Garlic or Sulphur compounds (of which Garlic is full).

Since salt is involved in the fermentation process, fermented Garlic will have a higher Sodium content than regular, unfermented Garlic.



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20 comments
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I have fermented veggies but now I will also try garlic. I like the idea of a milder taste sometimes. I hope mine does not become too green though.😀 However I know if it is covered in brine - any color change will be fine.
Thanks for your post.

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Oh man.. YES. I do it in honey which is amazing.

I'll have to do the brine one too.

Black garlic is a little different. I've done it with the warm setting with a Kmart rice cooker before. It only takes 21 days and stinks out the husband's shed 😂 so I'm not allowed to do it again...

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I never imagined eating black garlic. I would have always thought it spoiled at that stage 😲

This post has been manually curated by the VYB curation project

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For quite some time now I have been hearing about the medicinal benefits of garlic. Many of my friends consume it with great faith in the benefits it brings to the proper functioning of the heart. This modality is quite new to me and promises great results. I will take into account your advice on Fermented Garlic dear @ligayagardener see you soon and thank you for sharing such beneficial information....

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This is amazing information that everyone should know about and you did a fantastic job showing us the process and explaining the benefits of garlic!

I've never tried it fermented but I'm very interested.

I utilized a one raw clove a day regiment a few years ago to beat a serious addiction to a lifelong addiction to acid reflux disease medications poisons. There is no good use of these kinds of pills no matter what, I am convinced after a 20 year addiction to them almost killed me and a clove a day saved my life!

A clove a day is all you need to help with most ailments. Use the honey by the spoonful, just as you would regular honey.

It cures diseases and doesn't create prolonged dependency too!
It's a miracle herb.

Thank you for the amazing information, re-blogged to get the word out about Supercharged Fermented Garlic!!!

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i have purchased fermented black garlic from health food grocery stores in the past. quite pricey, i would add.

happy to learn the fermentation process from you here, myself. much Love 💗 Respect ✊ and Gratitude 🙏 for this data, and all you be and do!! 💥

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Let me know how you go with making your own.

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gotta settle down into some firmer roots, from all my current ✈️ jet-setting, before i get the opportunity to get hands-on to making my own.

it is perfect that i have the knowledge for the future! 🤲 thanks again!

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This is the first time that I encountered fermented garlic. I love garlic, with that being said, I am going to try this one out.

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In Indian cuisine, garlic is the most important spice or herb. And from my childhood, I have been eating garlic but never tasted fermented garlic. Yes, we make garlic pickles using some spices and lime juice but not like this. but now I will try it. thank you for this post greetings😊

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Let me know what you think of it when you try.

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I will wait to get special Indian garlic to make your recipe.

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