When you miss home, you cook something with too much garlic

Across cultures, garlic has always been functional: a base, a binder, a bold opening note. But for those living far from the places or people they once called home, garlic turns into something else entirely. A grounding ritual. A stand-in for memory. A tool to bring the past a little closer to the stove. This is not garlic as seasoning. It’s garlic as a salve.

A common language for longing

Garlic is a universal language: sharp, persistent and impossible to ignore. In immigrant households, diasporic kitchens and solo apartments thousands of miles from family, garlic rarely travels alone. It shows up with ginger, chilies and oil bubbling too quickly in a dented pan.

But when someone starts doubling or tripling it without blinking, it’s no longer about the dish but about dislocation. That’s how you end up with a garlic butter sauce so intense it could qualify as perfume — if perfume lingered on your fingertips for three days and made your eyes water when you opened the fridge.

That in-between is where many live now. Modern mobility has scattered families across time zones, continents and cities. In the silence between FaceTime calls and the ache between holidays, food becomes a proxy for presence. And garlic, immediate, pungent and unapologetic, delivers faster than anything else.

More than a craving

Most people don’t realize they’re homesick until the food starts to change. A pasta dish turns into a vehicle for garlic butter, more pungent than planned. A standard pot of dal suddenly tastes like something from childhood. There’s a noticeable shift toward bolder seasoning, longer prep or extra steps that no one else would notice.

It’s rarely about recreating a specific dish. In fact, it’s usually a mismatch: a hybrid of techniques, ingredients and instincts picked up across time zones and kitchens. Still, the goal is the same — to find something that tastes like belonging.

Cooking as connection

Food has long been a stand-in for connection, especially for people living far from where they started. But the cues today are more subtle. It’s not always elaborate meals or cultural celebrations. Sometimes, it’s just garlic bread on a Tuesday, cut too thick, toasted too long, finished with more butter than it needs.

These aren’t the dishes that get photographed or shared. They’re not made for anyone else. They’re small, improvised acts of comfort — a way of anchoring in place when the day feels unmoored.

Routines that say more than they seem

At first glance, it’s just a familiar recipe. Baingan bharta, maybe something roasted, mashed, thrown together without ceremony. But there’s a rhythm to the way it’s made that says more. The long roast, extra garlic and hand-mashing instead of the food processor. The details that make the dish feel like something remembered, even if it never quite turns out the same.

These choices often fly under the radar. No one points them out, but they repeat. A little more garlic here, a sauce that simmers longer than necessary and a pot that’s big enough to feed someone who isn’t there.

Not about authenticity

There’s no performance in these meals. No pressure to be authentic, no expectation to get it right. They’re not trying to recreate a grandmother’s exact spice blend or replicate a restaurant version of a childhood favorite. They’re just trying to feel close through smell, texture and something warm on a plate.

Even the messiness is part of the point. Burnt edges, split sauces and dishes that don’t quite land. The food doesn’t have to be perfect. It just has to do its job.

Memory in motion

These small rituals often go unnoticed. There’s extra garlic, a quiet hum while stirring and meals made in excess, stored away in mismatched containers. Together, these small details speak: they remember, they miss, they remain.

Cooking like this is a form of muscle memory that’s part inherited, part adapted. It doesn’t come with big declarations. It comes with hands moving without needing to think. With a kitchen that smells like somewhere else. With a dish that tastes like it was meant for more than one person, even if it wasn’t.

The story behind the smell

Garlic is just the easiest thing to notice. It lingers and soaks into clothes, but what it really signals is distance. The kind you can’t always name, but shows up around mealtime and doesn’t leave right away.

And while these meals don’t solve much, they do offer something real. A moment of familiarity. A taste that feels like home. The comfort of doing something you’ve done before, even if the reason you’re doing it is a little different now.