Spaniards and Italians, he noted snidely, ate the stuff with almost everything, but its “intolerable Rankness” made it a no-no for the respectable British veggie eater. “To be sure,” he added, “’tis not for Ladies Palats, nor those who court them.”

“Garlicks, tho’ used by the French,” wrote Amelia Simmons in American Cookery in 1796, “are better adapted to use in medicine than cookery.” Mrs. Isabella Beeton—author of the 1859 best-selling Book of Household ManagementMrs. Isabella Beeton—author of the 1859 best-selling Book of Household Management, a tome that discoursed on everything from the proper use of the pickle fork to the vascular system of plants—deemed garlic flatly offensive. “Garlic-eater,” from Elizabethan times, was a common pejorative for the vulgar,