1. What is Black Garlic?
Black garlic is inherently absent in nature. Black garlic is the finished product when white garlic undergoes a slow, fermentation process under strict conditions of temperature (60 degrees Celsius to 90 degrees Celsius) and humidity ranging from 80 to 90 degrees. The fermentation time is quite long, lasting from 30-60 days. As a result, white garlic is fermented into branched black garlic and the content of active ingredients in black garlic increases many times compared to white garlic when used.

Fresh garlic has the main ingredient allicin, this compound is easily hydrolyzed by the enzyme alinase to allicin. As for black garlic, due to the fermentation process, the content of active ingredients groups has increased much such as organic sulfur compounds, polyphenols, and fructose, especially the content of the main active ingredient is S-allyl-L-cysteine ​​(SAC). ) increased 4-5 times compared to regular garlic. Therefore, black garlic has a strong effect and is different from normal garlic.

In general, black garlic is quite easy to eat, completely different from white garlic which has a bad smell and pungent smell. Black garlic has a sweet, flexible taste, when peeled, it does not stick to your hands. Moreover, because there is no or little pungent smell to eat, it is possible to eat black garlic every day to promote health without fear of bad breath - an inconvenience and quite "sensitive" that makes many dare not eat much, even though they know it. Garlic is good for health.

2. Effects of black garlic on health
Anti-cancer: Black garlic has many anti-cancer compounds, which help increase the body's resistance, thereby reducing the risk of developing cancer cells and fighting free radicals.
Avoid infection, prevent fungus, check inflammation: Black garlic contains allicin, which has an antibiotic similar to fresh garlic, which helps prevent bacteria from entering the body, preventing fungus, and avoiding infection.
Prevent some chronic diseases: According to research, black garlic has twice the antioxidant effect of fresh garlic. Thereby helping to protect cells, anti-aging, prevent chronic non-communicable diseases such as high blood pressure, memory loss, diabetes ...
Black garlic has the effect of restoring muscle damage for exercise, improving digestive function, helping the body fight fatigue, laxatives, laxatives, promoting sleep, improving the function of prostate and other organs. other functions in the body.
Black garlic helps to scavenge free radicals very strongly, now more than 80 different diseases have been known to have causes related to free radicals. It can be said that black garlic is a very good medicine for disease prevention.
Black garlic has the effect of strengthening immunity, so it is used for people with weakened immunity due to chemical or irradiation, people who have been ill for a long time and their health is depleted. In particular, in the case of patients with flu, black garlic helps patients recover quickly and become healthy again.
Black garlic has the effect of inhibiting some cancer cell lines such as breast cancer, liver cancer, stomach cancer, colon cancer.
In addition, black garlic is also proven to lower blood cholesterol, reduce blood fat, increase HDL - Cholesterol, regulate blood sugar, so it is very good for the cardiovascular system, especially those at high risk such as: fat people, blood fat.
3. Who should and shouldn't use black garlic
Black garlic has many uses, but when using it, you need to pay attention to your health status as well as the purpose of use, to avoid waste and bad effects on health.

3.1. People with eye diseases should not use black garlic
According to scientific research, people who use black garlic for a long time will lead to eye damage and vision loss. Black garlic is not for people with eye diseases, anemia, dizziness, dizziness, tinnitus....

3.2. People with liver diseases when eating black garlic will lead to nausea
When entering the body, black garlic will produce substances that inhibit fluid secretion, affecting the digestive process, leading to impaired liver function. People with liver diseases when eating black garlic will lead to nausea, people who are being treated for liver disease eating black garlic will lead to anemia, which is not good for health.

3.3. Black garlic has ingredients that react to the treatment of kidney disease

People with kidney disease should not eat black garlic, because black garlic is pungent and spicy when entering the body, it will react with kidney treatment drugs causing unwanted side effects. Eating black garlic leads to ineffective medicine, causing the disease to recur, which is not good for health.

3.4. People with diarrhea should not eat black garlic because it makes the condition worse
People with diarrhea should not eat black garlic because black garlic will damage the intestinal lining, congestion affects the digestive tract as well as intestinal obstruction, making the patient worse.

3.5. Eating black garlic causes complications for people with low blood pressure
People with low blood pressure should also consider eating black garlic because it can cause health complications. Pregnant women should not eat too much black garlic or abuse it to cure diseases.

4. How to use black garlic properly
4.1. Direct use
You just need to peel and use directly 2-4 black garlic cloves/day. It is best to use it in the morning before a meal, chew it well and then drink 1 glass of water immediately.

4.2. Black garlic juice
Take 3-5 grams of black garlic with a cup of warm water into a blender and puree, use a food sieve to remove residue. You can drink black garlic juice immediately or use it with smoothies and fruit juices. To save time, you can puree black garlic in large quantities and store it in the refrigerator for later use.

4.3. Black garlic soaked in honey
Take about 125-150g of black garlic, peel off the skin and leave the whole tuber in a glass jar, pour honey into it to cover the black garlic; Soak for 3 weeks can be used. Every day you eat about 3 bulbs of black garlic and a spoon of honey, evenly divided into meals during the day.

Black garlic with honey is effective in treating flu, sore throat, and cold. In addition, it also supports the treatment of stomach pain and helps to limit aging and beautify the skin.

4.4. Black garlic soaked in wine
Take 250g of peeled black garlic and soak it with 1 liter of white wine in a glass jar for about 10 days. Every day you use 2-3 times, each time you use 30-40 ml after meals to help promote the optimal use of black garlic.

Black garlic soaked in wine is a remedy that helps the body to best absorb nutrients, has the ability to kill bacteria, prevent cancer, reduce blood fat, and protect the heart.

5. How to make black garlic at home
Ingredients for Black Garlic:

Garlic: 1kg
Beer: 1 can
Silver paper
Notice how to choose garlic:

You should choose fresh, large and round garlic bulbs, not bruised or scratched. Using lonely garlic (also known as 1-branch garlic, orphaned garlic) to make black garlic is the best because it has many nutrients, is easy to process and easy to peel when eaten. However, if you can't find a lonely type of garlic, you can choose garlic cloves instead.

Steps to take

Step 1: Clean the garlic
Garlic peels off an outer layer to remove dirt, cut off the garlic stalk if it is too long. (If the garlic is in a wet state, it should be dried, then peeled, cut the stalk).

Step 2: How to ferment garlic
* Use beer

Put the peeled garlic in a clean bowl, then pour the beer over it and soak it for 30 minutes, every 5 minutes, stir the garlic once to let the garlic infuse evenly.
Take out the garlic, wrap it in foil carefully, act quickly so that the garlic is not exposed to the air for too long. If garlic is exposed to the air for a long time, the quality will not be guaranteed.
* Do not use beer

You can also not need to ferment garlic with beer and still get finished black garlic. If you do not use beer, you can skip this step and move on to the step of brewing garlic with a rice cooker.

Step 3: Incubate garlic
You can brew garlic in a few different ways:

* Incubate garlic with rice cooker

Put the garlic in the rice cooker, turn on the warm mode and leave it on for 2 weeks without unplugging it. If you want to test the garlic, open the lid of the pot to see quickly, do not open the lid for more than 5 minutes / 1 time.
After 15 days, the garlic turns black, the skin dries and turns dark brown.
* Incubate garlic by machine

Garlic, after being soaked with beer, is placed in a tray, put in the garlic machine and then choose the mode of making black garlic. When the fermentation of black garlic finishes, the machine will automatically switch to standby mode.

* Incubate garlic in a pressure cooker

The pressure cooker also has the same mode as a rice cooker, you make black garlic like you do with a rice cooker. The pressure cooker will have a more stable power source, so making garlic will get a delicious, nutritious batch of black garlic.

For garlic that is not fermented by beer, place the cake rack in the rice cooker first to avoid direct contact with the bottom of the pot. Then, arrange the garlic in neat layers to match the capacity of the bottom of the pot. Finally, you turn on the warm button with the black garlic incubation temperature of 55-65 degrees Celsius for 10-12 days. If the black garlic gives off an odor, it's done.
6. Some notes when making and preserving black garlic

In order for home-made black garlic to be sweet and supple and not wet after fermentation, there are a few notes as follows:
If soaking garlic with beer, it should only be soaked for 30 minutes, every 5-10 minutes, the garlic must be stirred. After soaking the beer, it is necessary to take it out and let the garlic dry before wrapping it in paper and brewing it.
During the fermentation process, it is recommended to use a rice cooker with a lid and cover the outside of the pot with a layer of food wrap to avoid heat loss. It is advisable to check regularly to see if the garlic is fermenting satisfactorily.
Make sure the power supply is stable during the annealing process.
Clean the pot before making black garlic. During the process, keep the pot in a cool place and out of direct sunlight.
After incubation, if the garlic is slightly wet, it can be dried in the shade or dried with a fan to drain before using.
To preserve the best black garlic, you should put the whole bag of black garlic in a paper box or food container with a tight lid.

Store at room temperature: keep the black garlic intact in a vacuum bag, store it in a cool, dry place, avoid direct light.
Note:  Once opened (or without a vacuum bag) should be used up within 1 week.

Store in the refrigerator: place the whole black garlic in a vacuum bag in a food container to avoid direct contact with cold air.
Note:  If the vacuum packaging has been opened (or no vacuum is available), store the black garlic in an airtight container in the refrigerator, only use within 2-3 weeks. If left for a long time, garlic will be susceptible to mold.

Above are some effects of black garlic Gaha would like to introduce to everyone. It is both one of the nutritious foods and good for the health of the user. Try it now!