AFTER YOU EAT THIS, YOUR FRIENDS MAY NOT WANT TO SIT BY YOU

Eat onions in March and garlic in May, then the rest of the year your doctor can play.

– Old folk rhymeWhat GARLIC is to food, insanity is to art.

– Augustus Saint-Gaudens (designer of the gold coins that Steve Sjuggerud recommends owning)…

Garlic, also called "the stinking rose," is a bulbous plant of the genus "Allium." Technically, it is not a rose but closer to a lily – in fact, it is in the Liliaceae family. The garlic you buy in the supermarket is Allium sativum, and sativum simply means "cultivated." And most of the garlic in the grocery store is cultivated for both its flavor and health benefits.

Interestingly, garlic is probably the most studied of all plants touted for their health benefits. A simple literature search discovers several thousands of articles on the plant. Garlic is quite complex: Those simple little cloves turn out to have hundreds of chemical compounds. This makes the study of the physiology of garlic in human health difficult. Only recently has the biochemistry of garlic been elucidated. The health benefits are astounding. The main medicinal compound in garlic is called "allicin," and it probably provides the greatest health benefits…It turns out that allicin is only released when garlic is cut, chopped, or crushed. A paper in 1995 shows that allicin works as an antioxidant by scavenging hydroxyl free radicals. An older (1985) article in Scientific American describes how sulfur compounds are released when garlic is cut and chopped. It is thought that many other health benefits of garlic come from these sulfur compounds (for example, the antibacterial effects).

Garlic has long been considered in many cultures to be a wonder drug with a reputation for preventing everything from the common cold and flu to the plague. Legend has it that the construction workers of the pyramids were given garlic daily to protect themselves from disease and infection. Soldiers in World Wars I and II took garlic supplements to prevent gangrene. Even acne has been treated with raw garlic. There is good scientific evidence that garlic:

You can prepare garlic in many ways. Here are some simple tips: The first step (unless you are roasting the entire bulb) is to separate the individual cloves. Place the bulb on a cutting board or another hard surface and gently, but firmly, apply pressure with the palm of your hand at an angle. This will cause the layers of skin holding the bulb together to separate.

 To separate the skin from the individual cloves, place a clove with the smooth side down on a cutting board and gently tap it with the flat side of a wide knife. You can then remove the skin either with your fingers or with a small knife. If there is a green sprout in the clove's center, gently remove it since it is difficult to digest.

 Please note that the actual chopping or crushing of the garlic initiates the enzymatic process that converts the phytochemical alliin into allicin, the compound to which many of garlic's health benefits are attributed. If garlic is cooked immediately after chopping, allicin minimally forms, and the health benefits are missed. So be sure to wait about 10 minutes before eating or cooking the garlic. Many health professionals, including myself, recommend eating two to three cooked cloves of garlic a day.

When it comes to garlic… what do I do?

Here's to our health,

David Eifrig Jr., M.D., M.B.A.