Secretly Incredibly Fascinating: Garlic

Alex Schmidt and special guest Ellen Weatherford explore why garlic is secretly incredibly fascinating. Visit http://sifpod.fun/ for research sources, handy links, and this week's bonus episode.

LINKS FOR ELLEN WEATHERFORD:

• 'Just The Zoo Of Us' podcast (Maximum Fun)
• Ellen Weatherford on TikTok
• 'Spellbound and Gagged' podcast
• preview of the special "Cheddar Heist" podcast by Ellen Weatherford, Ella Hubber, Tom Lum, and Caroline Roper -- become a Maximum Fun member to hear the whole adventure!

RESOURCES USED TO INFORM THE EPISODE'S LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:

• native-land.ca
• U.S. Department Of Arts And Culture
• The True Native New Yorkers Can Never Truly Reclaim Their Homeland (Smithsonian)
• "Finding Lenapehoking" (YouTube / Hudson River Maritime Museum)
• Why Do They Call It Beacon? (The Highlands Current)
• Dutch & Native American Heritage In The Hudson River Valley (National Park Service)

RESEARCH SOURCES:

• Garlic: An Edible Biography by Robin Cherry
• The origins and distribution of garlic: How many garlics are there? (USDA Agricultural Research Service)
• Garlic, Allium sativum (University of Wisconsin-Madison Horticultural Extension)
• Garlic -- Allium sativum (Oregon State University College Of Agricultural Sciences)
• Garlic vs. Purple Garlic: What's the Difference? (AllRecipes.com)
• Lifestyle: Food: Am I Blue? (The Washington Post)
• Allium canadense -- Meadow Garlic, Wild Garlic, Wild Onion (Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center at UT Austin)
• Allium tricoccum -- Wild Leek, Ramp (Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center at UT Austin)
• Plant of the Month: Garlic Mustard (JStor Daily)
• Hot New Medicine: This 1,000-Year-Old Mixture of Garlic, Onion, Wine, and Cow Bile (Popular Mechanics)
• Staph Infection (Cleveland Clinic)
• The Scientific Secret of Garlic (Carnegie Museums)
• Why Does My Garlic Turn Green? | Ask The Food Lab (Serious Eats)
• You can taste garlic with your feet (Popular Science)
• The 2025 Ig Nobel Prizes honor garlicky babies, drunk bats, and more (Popular Science)
• The Ig Nobels are science's most lighthearted event. This year is 'not typical' (Science)
• How ‘Ennobling’ Helped Italian Aristocrats Solve the Problem of Garlic (Gastro Obscura)
• Garlic and Social Class: Immigrants from southern Italy were stereotyped for their use of the aromatic vegetable. (JStor Daily)
• Italian Garlic Debate Raises a Culinary Stink (NPR)
• It's A Wonderful (Italian-American) Life (NPR)
• Sweets: Garlic Ice Cream (Gastro Obscura)
• Secretly Incredibly Fascinating: Apples
• Secretly Incredibly Fascinating: Neapolitan Ice Cream
• Secretly Incredibly Fascinating: Diabetes