Every year at the beginning of farmer’s market season, I get increasingly anxious waiting for garlic scapes to show up. Scape season is really, really short, and they’re never really what you might call abundant. Usually one or two vendors at any given market will have maybe a dozen or so tiny bundles. If it’s a really good year, those vendors might have them available for two weeks. Maybe.
This year, though, I have garlic in my garden. I was actually on the ball and planted last October. Now, half of one of my 4′ x 4′ raised beds is full of huge, beautiful garlic stalks. I was starting to get really nervous that I’d been overconfident thinking I didn’t need to go on my desperate search for garlic scapes this year, because my garlic didn’t seem to be producing any. I’d nearly given up hope, and then after a few days so busy I had no time to do anything but turn on the drip lines to water (because my timer has dead batteries, and I’ve been too busy to get more), I went out this morning and there they were!