all allium to eat?
Antennaria@aol.com (Wed, 02 Nov 2005 20:57:04 PST)

I searched in vain this evening for the proper reference that I know I have,
but there was a study done in the 1950s or 1960s, I believe done by Harold E.
Moore and published in Baileya (a journal of horticultural taxonomy, part of
Cornell University), that states that all allium are edible, although not all
are palatable. There's lots of information on Allium species being used as a
food source by indigenous populations, in most of the Northern hemisphere,
numbering well over 100 species out of the family total of approximately 850 taxa
now recognized. It's interesting that there are whole sections of the genus
allium, where the plants have no onion smell at all (perhaps these are the
unpalatable ones?).

Regarding the term "winter garlic", what the hey is that? Just spent 1/2
hour google search on it, confirms my scorn for common names... they are quite
meaningless. I still don't know what botanical entity is meant by such a
nebulous term as "winter garlic". One would assume it refers to a form of Allium
sativum (garlic), but of course common names are often quite unrelated to any
botanical sensibility, and can even suggest the wrong genus, let alone the
specific species.

The following is an excerpt from a message I wrote to someone inquiring about
"Egyptian AirOnions":
==========================
The Egyptian Onion is indeed a form of Allium cepa (the latin name for the
common yellow onion). If you do a Google Search on "Egyptian Air Onion", you'll
get about 90,000 hits.... just tons and tons of information out there,
including sources where you can by them. But the best sources for buying them would
be in some of the bigger food and produce markets, particularly asian food
markets. The name Egyption Air Onion also goes by a variety of other (equally
silly) names such as Egyptian Walking Onion, Egyptian Tree Onion.

An excerpt from one such site (note: like many web links, it's full of
informational errors, but you get the idea):
http://www.vegparadise.com/highestperch312.html

"Wild onions presently grow in Central Asia where the whole family of onions
is said to have originated, though some say it was in the area of Iran,
Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Those familiar looking, round, mature bulbs are in the
Allium cepa genus that is part of the lily family. There are 325 species of
onions [MMcD: actually, there are about 875 species worldwide), 70 of which grow
in North America [MMcD: about 110 species grow in North America]. The grand
allium family includes onions, shallots, green onions (often called scallions),
chives, leeks, and garlic. "

"Food historians shake their heads regarding the exact origin of the onion.
Some varieties of onions have been given popular names like Egyptian onions or
Welsh onions with no evidence that they actually grew in those countries. For
instance, the Welsh onion, A. fistulosum, is considered quite primitive in
that it has never developed a bulb, but rather resembles a scallion with a
slightly thickened stem. The Welsh were not inclined to cultivate them on any large
scale, and they weren't even introduced into the country until 1629. "

"More confusing is the Egyptian onion, a tree onion that was actually unknown
in Egypt. A specimen of this unique onion variety came to the attention of
Frenchman Jacques Dalechamp, in his country in 1587. The Egyptian onion, never
having developed a substantial bulb, did not become popular because it has
difficulty developing seeds to reproduce itself. This variety was officially
introduced into Great Britain in 1820 from Canada. Historians have been puzzled to
see the tree onion, along with the Welsh onion, growing wild in North America."

So, in summary, the so-called Egyptian Onion has little bulbs that cluster at
the top of the flowering stem (common in Allium species), looking like a
cluster of shallots. These will sprout with green leaves, I suppose giving the
appearance of a trunk (the stem) and a tree top (the sprouting bulbils), thus
the rather silly name "tree onion". It's also called walking onion because when
the stems eventually collapse, the bulbils take root where the stem falls,
thus it's "walking". There is volumes and volumes of information on this
variety of yellow onion, and lots of sources of seed and bulbs of this variety.

end or article
===========================

Moving on, regarding "garlic chives", Jim McKenney is quite right that this
refers to Allium tuberosum, a late summer to fall blooming Asian species. It's
quite invasive, and I do not recommend growing it, even though pretty. The
foliage easily detaches from the tenacious roots when pulling it, requiring a
tap-root digging tool to get it out. It is "apomictic"; that is, it is self
fertile and sets seed very quickly without the need of cross fertilization. It
can have fresh flowers and ripe seed capsules on the plant at the same time...
making it a menace in the garden.

It varies slightly in flower color... always white, but sometimes with an
intense red midvein apparent on the outside of the tepals (noticeably in the bud
stage only). Typically it is an erect plant flowering at about 18"-24" tall
(45-60 cm). For some bizarre reason, it is often confused with Allium ramosum,
but that species flowers in early summer, and looks completely unlike A.
tuberosum, except perhaps that it too has white flowers. Allium ramosum is a
perfectly good white-flowered species to grow, reaching 3' (90 cm) or more in
height.

Allium sativum var. ophioscorodon, or "snake garlic", is a "way-cool" plant.
Not showy on account of it's flowers (there are none.. the flowers are
replaced by bulbils) but because the erect stalks coil in serpentine fashion at the
top of the stems, in a most intriguing fashion. It's worth growth just for
the coiling snake-like growth habit, and in my experience, the bulbilliferous
heads are not invasive... never seen a "self-sown" bulbil-induced plant growing
in my garden so far, and eventually I lost this plant.

In the many forms of Allium tuberosum I've grown, some are fragrant and some
aren't. I've never smelled a "tuberose" for comparison, but indeed some forms
of Allium tuberosum are sweetly fragrant.

I was gathering together a PBS posting on "autumn crocus", but have been
trying to take in the explosion of messages on Allium sativus on PBS, and haven't
yet read the litany of messages. I'm glad Arnold posted a photo of C.
sativus, as it was long overdue given the discussion-thread, and trumped my
introducion of pertinent photos. Perhaps by this weekend, I hope to upload
approximately a dozen photographs of autumn crocus or more. No one has mentioned the
Turkish Crocus pallasii var. pallasii, one of my very favorite autumn crocus that
blooms in very late October though mid November. More on autumn crocuses to
follow.

Mark McDonough Pepperell, Massachusetts, United States
antennaria@aol.com "New England" USDA Zone 5
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