I used to spray mine quickly with water and then peel off the outer layer before drying them. I found I had less problems after doing that than leaving the dirt on them. One thing for sure you need fairly low humidity to dry them properly. I had to use an air conditioned building to properly dry garlic down here otherwise when it got really humid or during rainy weather the drying garlic would just soak the water right out of the air and if this happened too often much of the garlic would ruin.
One thing I really know made a difference in growing large heads of garlic was to keep any weeds away from them as they do not compete well for nutrients. I found mulching them made it much easier to keep the weeds away.
Bill
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