Garlic Is Abhorrent

"If ever any man is criminal enough
To break his aged father's neck,
A death by garlic, not by hemlock, let him die.
How tough our reapers' guts must be!"

— Horace, Epode 3

Garlic has meant many things to different cultures throughout the generations. It's been seen as a miracle cure-all and the secret to immortality, but also been seen as disgusting or even toxic. Garlic's particular smell has been well-noted throughout human history. While some learn to ignore it or even like it, others find it unbearable.

Garlic is a traditional staple in many cultures' cuisines. China, Russia, Italy, India, Korea, and France are some of the many countries that have a long history with the aromatic. In others such as Japan and Britain, garlic is traditionally looked down upon with disdain. Even within cultures, views on garlic can differ, especially between the different social classes. For example, while ancient Roman soldiers and poor civilians often used garlic, the upper class were prone to loathing it. This has caused garlic and garlicky dishes to become stock Foreign Queasine in many countries.

"Garlic eater" has been an insult that dates back at least 2000 years. It can be a general insult, a classist euphemism for the lower class, or even an ethnic slur (often against Jewish or Italian people).

Garlic is referenced in all sorts of folklore and mythology. It has a history of being used for charms of all sorts and is known for being able to repel or even defeat all types of demons, ghosts, and monsters (often due to its smell). Vampires Hate Garlic is the most well-known example of this.

It is only in the 20th century that garlic began to become popular worldwide. In the 1920s it gained some popularity in England and America when salads became popular. Rubbing salad bowls with garlic was seen as a way of adding extra flavour to the salad. It however wasn't until the 1950s and 1960s that garlic became socially acceptable in general. American chefs such as Julia Child and British chefs such as Elizabeth David brought garlic to the mainstream and made it popular amongst cultures that traditionally loathed it. Despite this, jokes about it still exist, though most are about its horrible smell more than anything.

People who enjoy the taste of garlic do have something to rejoice about though; Garlic is rich in sulfur, an important element used by the body in proteins of a wide variety of purposes and sizes.

Sub-trope to Stock "Yuck!".

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Examples:

Anime and Manga

• In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Steel Ball Run, Sugar Mountain repeats several pieces of advice given to her by her parents, among them a vehement 'Never eat garlic!'
• Mon Colle Knights: Whenever Rokuna has any food to present, it will invariably be overloaded with garlic. Mondo and Ichirobei both detest it, but Beginner is overjoyed when she first tries it out.
• Kinnikuman, Butt-Monkey super hero by excellence, needs to eat garlic to use his powered up form. More often than not, he's insulted for this (and other reasons).
• Averted in the Food Porn manga Toriko, which includes several garlic-based ingredients, king of all the "Meteor Garlic", a supremely tasty garlic specimen that makes your muscles grow in size.

Comic Books

• In an issue of The Simpsons, Bart is trying to trick Principal Skinner into eating a prank breathmint that will stain his teeth with ink on school picture day. He tells him that cameras can record smell now and holds up a picture of Skinner with a clove of garlic hidden behind it. Skinner says that he shouldn't have had his mother's garlic oatmeal for breakfast.
• Buttercup has a garlic addiction in The Powerpuff Girls story "Pizza My Heart" (DC issue #41). Her breath is so repellent that even an invading monster decides to retreat instead of fight her.

Films — Live-Action

• Are You Being Served?: Mr. Grainger doesn't like Spanish food as he believes there is too much garlic in it.
• In Doctor in Distress (1963), Dr. Sparrow claims the reason Sir Lancelot's aunt is still a maiden at the age of 92 is due to the fact she is never without a bit of garlic next to her skin:
  Sir Lancelot: You know... you're quite wrong to despise these old folk remedies. I've got a Maiden Aunt who swears by garlic. Never without a bit next to skin. I'm convinced that's why she's lived to be 92.
  Dr. Sparrow: Perhaps that's why she's still a maiden at 92.
• This trope has never been averted harder than in documentary feature Garlic Is as Good as Ten Mothers, which is a love letter to "the stinking rose" and its devoted enthusiasts.

Literature

• The ancient Roman poet Horace hated garlic and made it clear in his works. After being given a garlicky dish (moretum), he wrote a Take That! against it in Epode 3 after getting indigestion. He compares it to both viper's blood and the poison that killed Hercules, and wonders if his dish was tampered by Canidia (an ancient Roman witch).
• The 19th century British poet Percy Bysshe Shelley travelled to Italy and was astonished by the use of garlic. Garlic was considered a Foreign Queasine and especially was not consumed by the well-to-do:
  What do you think? Young women of rank eat - you'll never guess what - garlick!
• The first known English-language book on salads, John Evelyn's Acetaria: A Discourse Of Salets, forbids garlic due to its smell. Evelyn thought garlic was only suitable for sailors and "rustic northerns". He even states that it is "part of the Punishment of such as had committed the horrid'st Crimes" and that "'Tis not for Ladies Palats, nor those who court them".
• Isabella Beeton's Book of Household Management was an influential 1861 book on how to run a Victorian home. It's mentioned that "the smell of this plant [garlic] is generally considered offensive."
• Referenced in The English People by George Orwell from 1947 about the British disdain for garlic at the time:
  As a rule, they will refuse even to sample a foreign dish, they regard such things as garlic and olive oil with disgust, life is unlivable to them unless they have tea and black pudding.
• The British food writer Elizabeth David poked fun of the 1920s trend of using garlic on salad plates:
  The grotesque prudishness and archness with which garlic is treated in this country has led to the superstition that rubbing the bowl with it before putting the salad in gives sufficient flavor. It rather depends on whether you're going to eat the bowl or the salad.
• Don Quixote: At one point Quixote is disgusted when he smells raw garlic on a girl he assumes is Dulcinea. Sancho placates him by saying that magicians have turned her into a common peasant by stealing her smell and replacing it with a garlicky one.
• In The Canterbury Tales, garlic is described as being only for commoners. Chaucer poked fun at them with the quote "(...)'Well loved he garleek, onyons and eek lekes/And for to drinken strong wyn, reed as blood(...)".
• In Paddington Bear, one of the stories involves Paddington going to a gymkhana, where he accidentally eats a bulb of garlic, mistaking it for one of Mrs Brown's meringues. Numerous people comment on the smell, but he is then able to win the 'Chase Me Charley' event by breathing in his horse's face to make her jump over the fences, despite failing every round before.
• In The Ear, the Eye and the Arm, the titular trio's fondness for garlic soup is treated as one of the signs that they're solidly on the low end of the class divide, compared to their prestigious clients.
• Discworld generally portrays garlic as great (the fact it's an abomination to the god Nuggan is an early sign that Nuggan is a petty sadist), but there are limits, and they mostly involve Nanny Ogg:
  • In Witches Abroad, Nanny's enthusiasm for the garlic sausage served at an Überwald inn leads to the other two witches quickly requesting separate rooms.
  • In Carpe Jugulum, Nanny has a cunning ploy to expose the vampires at the wedding feast by serving hors d'oeuvres that consist entirely of garlic and nothing else.
    Agnes: Either there's a lot of vampires out there or we're doing something wrong.
    Nanny: I always say you can't have too much garlic.
    Agnes: Everyone else disagrees.
• In Times of Contempt Yennefer asks Geralt not to eat anything with garlic at the banquet during the Sorcerers Conclave on the Thanedd island, apparently hoping for a nice romp afterwards. We all know how well that ended.
• Spice and Wolf: While on a trip through a winter set land, Lawrence and company stop at a waystation to rest. There is much complaining about the smell from the heavy amounts of garlic the other travelers are using to mask the low quality of their ingredients. There's also much rejoicing at the amazing food their guide has prepared. It is then revealed that the secret ingredient to this delicious meal is just a more restrained use of garlic and a bit more care while preparing the ingredients.
• On a list of top ten hates at the end of an Artemis Fowl novel, author Eoin Colfer puts both onions and garlic, referring to them as "stinky vegetables".

Live-Action TV

• In one episode of Bananas in Pyjamas, one of the Bananas is mildly grossed out when adding garlic to a curative soup for Morgan.

Newspaper Comics

• Garfield has actually invoked this trope by using horrible garlic breath to stun people so he can steal their food.
• In Rose is Rose, whenever someone has eaten garlic, their breath is portrayed with skulls and everyone is repulsed by it. This is played with in one strip, where Rose laments how wonderful garlic bread smells while it's baking only to turn into a nauseating miasma after someone eats it.

Religion

• A number of hadiths (traditions based on Muhammad's words and actions) recommend against eating raw garlic before mosque attendance, in reference to its odor.
• The Bowser Manuscript is a collection of treatises of Ayurveda medicine. The first document describes how garlic came to be. Vishnu was distributing nectar to the demigods when he was tricked into giving two demons nectar. He cut their heads off before the nectar went down their throats. Where the nectar fell on the ground sprouted garlic and onion. According to Ayurveda eating garlic makes you strong like a demon but also makes you as unintelligent as one too.

Theatre

• Like many in his day, William Shakespeare disliked garlic. His plays feature quite a few negative references to it:
  • In Hamlet, Hotspur uses garlic as an insult:
    I'd rather live with cheese and garlic in a windmill, far, than feed on cates and have him talk to me in any summerhouse in Christendom.
  • Dorcas from The Winter's Tale snidely tells her romantic rival Mopsa that she should eat garlic to improve her breath for kissing.
  • In A Midsummer Night's Dream, a character says "And most dear actors, eat no onions nor garlic for we are to utter sweet breath."

Toys

• SuperThings has the character Count Garlik. Being a living garlic bulb, he is a foul-breathed villain that uses his toxic fumes as his weapon of choice. Despite garlic being associated with lower class and feared by vampires, he instead dresses up as a cravat-wearing vampire, though it's not fully stated if he is one or not.

Video Games

• All three playable characters in Epic Battle Fantasy 3 dislike garlic, which is eaten raw there to heal status ailments.
• In Plants vs. Zombies, Garlic is apparently abhorrent enough to disgust even zombies. Zombies who took a bite of Garlic will make a disgusted face and move to other lanes afterwards. In the second game, Garlic's Plant Food ability is breathing a pungent smell that affects the entire lane. All zombies in the range will switch lanes. In Plants vs. Zombies: Heroes, any zombie attacking Garlic is forced to move one lane to the left unless they're Vimpire or Ancient Vimpire, who get instantly destroyed.
• Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom has "deathbreath garlic" as an ingredient to cook with.
• Villainous Glutton (though he's more of an Anti-Hero nowadays) Wario of Super Mario Bros. has a Trademark Favorite Food of garlic. He's prone to Toilet Humour and it's even stated that the reason he has Eternally Pearly-White Teeth is that his garlic-eating habits scare off bacteria.
• Twisted Wonderland: Garlic is Rook's least favorite food.

Western Animation

• How the Grinch Stole Christmas!: Garlic is referred to obviously negatively in "You're A Mean One, Mr Grinch" with the line "You've got garlic in your soul."
• Jackie Chan Adventures: Uncle's Trademark Favorite Food is garlic, which the rest of the Chan clan finds disgusting, especially since he tends to reek of garlic after eating so much of it.
• Sonic Boom: "Cowbot" has a scene where Eggman serves cookies and hot chocolate to Sonic and Tails. The two clearly dislike the taste, which is apparently because Eggman used garlic as the secret ingredient.

Real Life

• During Shakespearean days, the "groundlings" (people who paid one penny to stand in the theatre's pit area) often snacked on garlic cloves. Richer patrons often called them "penny stinkers" and "garlic-mouthed stinkers."

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