To Your Health
By James N. Dillard, M.D.
(02/11/2010) She could feel herself falling under his spell. The night was spinning overhead. As she gazed deep into his piercing dark eyes, her pulse raced, her knees went weak. She felt the blood drain from her cheeks, and only his strong arm could hold her up. She was slipping, slipping.
A perfect ivory throat was revealed to him. He bowed slowly to taste it, opening his mouth to reveal long, hungry incisors under moist ruby lips. This was the moment he had been waiting for.
Then he saw them out of the corner of his eye — the pale, clustered cloves clenched at her breast. He recoiled in horror.
“Damn it, Cheryl, you haven’t chopped them up yet? We don’t have time for this! The marinara’s almost ready,” he barked.
“I would have, Tony, if you hadn’t taken so long at the gym. I had to make the salad,” she sniped back.
Some people are repelled by garlic. But for the rest of us it is almost an aphrodisiac. The medicinal uses of garlic are as old as the hills, and an interesting tale to tell.
Garlic, also known as “the stinking rose,” has been used as a natural medicine, antibiotic, and herb by cultures around the world for millennia. It has been thought to have magical powers to ward off evil spirits. Garlands of garlic were strung over doorways during the great plagues. As vampires became legendary in 18th-century Eastern Europe, garlic was embraced by the church as a defense against these evil beings.
You may recall the line in Frank Capra’s immortal “It’s a Wonderful Life” when George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) is described as a man trapped by running the Bedford Falls savings and loan — “Yes sir, trapped! Into frittering his life away being nursemaid to a lot of garlic eaters. . . .”
Proper (white) people of 1946 didn’t eat garlic. That was for “low-class” Italians and other southern Europeans. The prejudice of the time was clearly symbolized by reference to this herb, denoting a line between the nation’s Protestant founders and later working-class Catholic immigrants. In the 1920s, garlic was referred to as Bronx vanilla and Italian perfume. Now Americans consume more than 250 million pounds per year.
Garlic, a k a Allium sativum, is a member of the onion family alliaceae, which includes the leek, shallot, onion, and chive. Its name derives from the Old English garleac, meaning “spear leek.” The Egyptians worshiped garlic, and placed it in the tombs of their pharaohs, such as Tutankhamen. The cloves were even used as currency.
Physicians of ancient Greece and Rome used garlic for many infections, from dog bites, for example, and for leprosy. Greek generals fed garlic to their troops before battle to give them courage and stamina (or perhaps to overwhelm the enemy with the stench).
In 17th-century England garlic was rejected as unfit for the court because of its lingering odor. This neglect of garlic carried over in the American colonies well into the mid-20th century, when French and Italian chefs finally revived interest in the herb.
Louis Pasteur demonstrated the antibacterial properties of garlic in 1858. During World War II, raw garlic solutions were used by Russian and British troops to disinfect wounds and prevent gangrene when antibiotics were scarce.
Though garlic has been traditionally touted for lowering cholesterol and high blood pressure, as well as protecting against heart disease and cancer, the most recent research has been disappointing. Though garlic has been shown to thin the blood very slightly, a large study published in The Archives of Internal Medicine in 2007 did not show it to improve cholesterol or other blood fats.
Still there is some evidence that garlic wards off and helps with the common cold. Cherokees used it as an expectorant in coughs, and fungal mouth infections such as thrush have been shown to be helped by garlic.
For those who get an upset stomach or gas from garlic, removal of the germ from the center of the clove can do the trick. Some people will exude the smell of garlic from every pore for days after they eat it, and others do not. This can create social indelicacy, but there’s always perfume. Parsley or fennel seeds can be effective in removing the odor from the mouth.
So eat as much garlic as you like; it’s healthy. But don’t expect it to be an adequate substitute for your cholesterol-lowering statins, amoxicillin, low-dose aspirin, or your blood pressure medicine. If you really love garlic, visit Gilroy, Calif., garlic capital of the world, for its famous garlic-flavored ice cream.
Now, back to our story. The others had gone. She felt drained, stretched across the chaise, legs akimbo. A sweet-savory taste remained on her tongue, but she longed for more. She turned his head and found it again on his lips. It was strong, but not for others — the glorious rare rose that they had shared.
Perhaps I aspire to write soft-core bodice-rippers based on herbal medicines. Okay, maybe not a such good idea, but this little tale is allium a day’s work.
Questions can be directed to Dr. James N. Dillard at jdillard@ehstar.com.