Is Garlic Low FODMAP? (And What to Use Instead)

Michael Eisenwasser 6 min read

Garlic shows up in almost every savory recipe most of us grew up cooking. Soups, stir-fries, pasta sauces, salad dressings, marinades. When you start the low-FODMAP diet and find out garlic is out, the first question is usually: how am I supposed to cook anything?

The good news is that giving up garlic the ingredient doesn't mean giving up garlic flavor. There's a well-established workaround, validated by Monash University (the research team that built the low-FODMAP diet). This post walks through why garlic is high FODMAP, what that actually means in practice, and the specific substitutes that work.

The short answer

Fresh garlic is high FODMAP. Even a single clove is not elimination-phase compliant.

But garlic-infused oil is low FODMAP and safe on the diet. That's the loophole that makes low-FODMAP cooking livable.

Why garlic is high FODMAP

The "O" in FODMAP stands for oligosaccharides, which includes fructans. Garlic is one of the highest fructan foods on the planet.

Fructans are chains of fructose sugars that the human small intestine can't break down. They pass undigested into the large intestine, where gut bacteria ferment them. That fermentation produces gas and draws water into the gut, which is what triggers bloating, cramping, and altered bowel habits in people with IBS.

Monash lists fresh garlic as high FODMAP even at very small serves. It's generally avoided entirely during the elimination phase.

Things that don't work (but people try)

A few substitutions come up a lot. Most of them don't actually solve the problem.

Garlic powder and garlic salt. Still high in fructans. Dehydration removes water, not fructans. A teaspoon of garlic powder is concentrated garlic: it's worse than a clove, not better.

Roasted garlic. Cooking doesn't break down fructans. A whole roasted head has the same FODMAP load as the raw cloves, just softer and sweeter.

Less garlic. Some people try cutting the recipe's garlic in half. Garlic's fructan density is high enough that even a quarter clove is still high FODMAP. "A little" isn't elimination-phase compliant.

Fermented garlic (like black garlic). The fermentation process is sometimes claimed to reduce FODMAPs, but this hasn't been confirmed by Monash testing and most people still react to it. Skip it for now.

Why garlic-infused oil works

This is the move that makes the diet livable.

Fructans are water-soluble, not fat-soluble. When you steep garlic in oil, the flavor compounds dissolve into the oil, but the fructans stay locked in the cloves. The oil takes on the full garlic flavor without carrying the FODMAP load.

You pour off the oil, discard the cloves, and cook with the flavored oil as if it were regular garlic. Monash has confirmed that garlic-infused oils are low FODMAP when they contain no garlic solids, and certifies specific brands that meet that standard. Any solid garlic pieces floating in the oil would still carry fructans, so they need to be strained out.

Two ways to get it:

1. Buy it. Look for brands with the Monash FODMAP certified logo. Cobram Estate's garlic-infused extra virgin olive oil is one readily available certified option in the US.
2. Make it at home. Warm olive oil with crushed cloves over low heat for about 15 minutes, strain through cheesecloth, and discard every bit of solid garlic. Refrigerate and use within a week. Food safety note: garlic in oil can grow botulism bacteria if stored at room temperature, so refrigeration is not optional.

Use infused oil anywhere you'd normally start by sautéing garlic: the base of a stir-fry, the drizzle on pasta, a salad dressing, the pan for eggs.

Other substitutes worth knowing

Garlic-infused oil is the main move, but a few other ingredients fill in flavors that oil alone can't cover.

Green scallion tops (the green part of a green onion). Only the green tops are low FODMAP. The white bulbs are high-fructan like onions. Green tops give a mild oniony bite in everything from stir-fries to garnishes. Slice thin and add near the end of cooking.

Chives. Low FODMAP at standard serving sizes. Good for garnish, omelets, baked potatoes, and dips.

Garlic chives (Chinese chives). A different plant from regular chives, with a more garlicky flavor. Low FODMAP in standard cooking serves.

Asafoetida (hing). A sulfurous resin used in Indian cooking that tastes remarkably close to cooked garlic and onion when it hits hot oil. A pinch goes a long way. Buy pure asafoetida, not a blend, because some commercial hing is cut with wheat flour, which adds fructans back in.

Leek greens. Only the dark green tops, not the white or pale-green bulb. Same rule as scallions.

None of these alone fully replaces garlic. The combination that works best for most cooks is garlic-infused oil as the base, plus scallion greens or chives layered on top.

FODMAP stacking: watch the total

One thing worth flagging. FODMAPs from different foods add up. If your dinner has garlic-infused oil (fine on its own), plus a generous helping of avocado, plus a big scoop of chickpeas, you can still end up over your threshold even though each of those foods has a low-FODMAP serving size. The serving size is what decides whether something is low FODMAP, and portions stack across a meal.

This is called FODMAP stacking, and it's one of the most common reasons people say the diet "stopped working." Tracking what you eat and how you feel makes the patterns visible fast.

What this looks like in practice

A weeknight dinner pattern that works well: olive oil into the pan, a splash of garlic-infused oil added right before the aromatics so the flavor doesn't cook off, the green tops of a scallion or two, your protein, some low-FODMAP vegetables, salt, pepper. It tastes close to the Italian-leaning cooking most of us grew up on. People rarely notice there's no real garlic in it.

That's the bar to aim for: food that tastes like what you used to eat, not "FODMAP food." Infused oil plus scallion greens gets you most of the way there.

For meal ideas that use this substitution pattern, see our low-FODMAP recipes.

When can you eat real garlic again?

The elimination phase is typically 2 to 6 weeks long, not permanent. After that comes the reintroduction phase, where you test each FODMAP group individually to see what you actually react to. Fructans, the group garlic belongs to, is one of the standard reintroduction challenges.

Many people find they tolerate small amounts of garlic during reintroduction. Not everyone, and not at every quantity, but more than you'd expect. The elimination phase is a reset, not a life sentence.

Track your symptoms and discover patterns with FODMAP Tracker. Includes a database of 1,000+ foods with FODMAP ratings.