"Rounds" of garlic for sale

[realfood]

For the first time, I have seen small "Rounds" of garlic for sale in Lidl. They are about 1/3 of the size of a traditional head of garlic and are solid with no cloves. I assume that they are sold like that, as they are easier to peel.
They are much milder than normal garlic and have a striped purple skin.
I assume that they are planted in the normal way, and lifted and dried off early, before the round starts to split into cloves.

Or perhaps they are grown from the little bulbils that are sometimes found in the flower head of hardneck garlic, sometimes called "grass". I am actually growing a container full of "garlic grass" for the first time. These will probably end up as rounds at the end of this season.
Has anyone else come across this type of garlic before?

[realfood]

[Baccy Man]

Sounds like single clove garlic.

Single Clove Garlic is grown almost exclusively in Yunnan Province in China. They grow more like shallots than garlic each clove planted produces numerous rounds. The rounds are irradiated & root trimmed so they can't be grown before being shipped around the world & being sold for premium prices.

http://www.prettygarlic.com/products/singleclove.htm

Edit:
A lot of places in America & Australia refuse to sell it due to chemicals used to grow/process it & concerns over the irradiation process.
http://www.garlicseedfoundation.info/fall_94/irradiated.htm
http://www.naturalnews.com/022801.html

[Pescador]

Not one for anyone who wants to organic then?!

[thifasmom]

blech!!! :-X another reason for growing your own

[Levi]

Did you ever get your black garlic?

[thifasmom]

Did you ever get your black garlic?

nope :-\ did you?

[debster]

nope me neither  :-\

[Robert_Brenchley]

Might be one to try if (when) we find some that actually grows.

[Barnowl]

My elephant Garlic only gave me a single spherical clove last year.

[caroline7758]

Did you ever get your black garlic?

No. >:(

[PurpleHeather]

I bought some of the single cloves of round garlic in Asia a few years ago and brought them home, I planted a few and they came up just like ordinary garlic small bulbs but they were all right.

[Robert_Brenchley]

My elephant Garlic only gave me a single spherical clove last year.

I get one or two of those every year. I mostly put them in the flowerbeds, but if you plant them I think they clove up in the second year.

[pamsdish]

Those type of garlic is very common round the med countries, i think its great like a golf ball, just peel and chop no fiddling with little cloves ,
i`m off to lidls see if they still have any