AN ABUNDANCE OF POTATOES.

With a bit of luck I can manage to grow several crops of potatoes each year, planting the first seed potatoes in  October with a further planting after Christmas. Potatoes will handle quite rough soil so are a good crop to put into new ground. They are not a deep rooted plant like carrots, which will push down into the soil. Instead, the tubers grow out from the original seed potato. It is necessary to hill them as the plants grow to cover the young tubers. If you keep building up the soil around the stem of the plant they will continue to make fresh tubers in ever increasing layers. This may also be done by creating a support for the soil with rubber tires mounted on rubber tires.  This is a great way of cropping for people with limited gardening space. Using this method it is also possible to grow potatoes in the milder winter climates, providing the tops are covered each night against frost.

Potatoes are well suited to growing in furrows which can be flooded with a garden hose and is the way I prefer to grow mine. To get an early start this year I planted two rows of seed potatoes in October amongst the red Flanders poppies in my Remembrance Field at Das Helwig Haus B&B at Glen Aplin on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland.

Potato rows

Three young Koreans came in November to work for me as WWOOFers – Willing Workers on Organic Farms and as the poppies finished flowering they removed them and hilled the potatoes.

Hilled potatoes

Meanwhile I had planted a later patch of potatoes, a different variety, on the opposite corner of the field. My non-organic vegetable farming neighbors when given fresh potatoes in February, asked what chemicals I had used on the crop?

I replied, “None.” One of the secrets to growing good crops of any vegetable is to rotate your crops and never grow potatoes in the same place for at least 3 years. Repetitive growing of the same vegetable in the same ground each year will not only result in depletion of soil nutrients essential to that plant, but also a build up of pests – either leaf feeders or root borers. Potatoes appreciate feeding on rich compost or manures and need plenty of water during the growing season. I prefer to buy fresh seed potatoes each year, rather than use left over shooting potatoes from my pantry to avoid spreading any disease.

A second crop of potatoes.

As the leaves ripen up the plants tend to fall over to the side and it is important at that time to ensure the tubers close to the surface are covered with additional earth or a mulch of hay to prevent sunburn and greening. Any potato exposed to the sunlight will acquire green skin. This green portion of the potato is poisonous and any potato showing green should be peeled deeply, or discarded.

Korean Wwoofers digging potatoes

Here the three Koreans (Ashley, Jack and Jinni) were harvesting Sebago potatoes. Jack is using a brand new stainless steel digging fork, which my father gave me for a Christmas present. The other varieties I grew were Kennebeck and Desiree. Again to avoid possible contamination of my soil, I do not compost my potato greens, but burn them.  If it is possible to establish a different place each year where you can burn garden waste and then plant vegetables like melons or pumpkins in the ash, you will be rewarded with excellent crops as the heat destroys the natural pathogens lurking in most soils.

Jack washing the potatoes.

The potatoes were washed, sorted according to size and stored in our cellar room at 8 degrees Celcius.

Stored potatoes

I’m sure you  know many ways of serving potatoes, but have you ever made your own potato crisps?

• Choose small to medium potatoes of an even size.
• Wash potatoes, but don’t peel.
• Slice the potatoes as thinly as possible. I have a meat slicer which cuts much thinner and neater slices than I could manage with a sharp knife.
  

  Slicing potatoes.

• Thread the potato slices on to wooden skewers.
• Sprinkle salt or other flavoring over the potato slices.
• Suspend three skewers across a microwave safe bowl.
• Place the bowl in a microwave oven and cook for 7-10 minutes. The time required will depend on the thickness of your slices.
• Remove from the microwave oven, cool and strip off the skewer.
• Store in an airtight container for future use as potato crisps.
  

  Raw, salted potato slices.

  

  Cooked potato crisps.

ENJOY!