Abundant by the bag load and as cheap as chips, we all love a good spud. Buttered-up in summer, wrapped in their jackets in autumn and given a roasting in winter – they are a kitchen staple, and really easy to grow.
Having spuds on tap means you can try new and interesting varieties and know they’ve been grown without chemicals. There’s simply nothing better than new potato lightly boiled with a sprig of mint – especially when it’s been picked fresh from your garden that same day.
Pick a potato
While there are more than 5,000 types of potato grown around the world, they all fall into two distinct camps. ‘Floury’ potatoes have a low water content with a brighter, drier and more granular texture that’s great for absorbing flavours, making them best for chips and roasties. ‘Waxy’ potatoes have a higher water content with moist and translucent flesh, which stays firm when boiled, making them a good choice for a classic potato salad.
Potatoes are also categorised by when they are planted and harvested. So ‘First Early’, ‘Salad’ or ‘New’ potatoes, such as Aura or Epicure, are planted first and harvested roughly ten weeks later. ‘Second Early’ potatoes, such as Blue Kestrel or Charlotte, are planted slightly later in March/April and harvested within 13 weeks. Finally, ‘Maincrop’ or ‘Late’ varieties, such as Arran Victory or Golden Wonder, are harvested in late summer or early autumn when their skins are firm and set.
Get growing
Your first step is to order seed potatoes from gardening catalogues or the garden centre. But hurry because they sell like hot chips! Supermarket potatoes are sprayed with growth inhibitors so won’t make a good crop. During February and early March you can get them prepared for their journey to the outdoors.
Most potatoes benefit from ‘chitting’ (a posh word for sprouting) and they don’t need much encouragement to do it. If you’ve ever left potatoes in a bag for too long, you’ll have seen the white juicy tendrils shooting out in search of light. But the kind of shoots you want, in order to give your potatoes a head start outdoors, are tight, short and greeny-purple.
To do this, pop your seed potatoes into old egg boxes or seed trays and place them in a light, bright, frost-free place (not above a radiator). Make sure the ‘eyes’ are looking skyward, and once the chits get to 3cm (1in) long, they’re ready to go out. This is usually mid-March/April, provided your soil is not waterlogged or frozen.
What’s next?
Old school potato growers will instruct you to spend the next two days digging yourself into a trench (12cm deep trenches in fact, with potatoes placed 15cm apart). But while this method does produce good results, you’ll be pleased to hear it’s not the only way.
You can also place your seed potatoes on the surface of the soil, covering with a thick straw mulch, or a layer of black plastic (cut with holes). And you can grow them in raised beds and containers, such as compost bags or trugs. Black bags are particularly good at absorbing heat and speeding up early growth.
Fill your containers quarter of the way with a good quality peat-free compost first. Place the tubers on top ‘chit up’ (you can plant 3-4 per 40-litre pot). Cover with a little compost and keep well-watered.
A key thing to remember is to ‘earth up’. This means drawing the soil up and around emerging growth, or in the case of containers and raised beds, placing more soil on top of new growth. It might seem counterintuitive to ‘smother’ your fledgling plants in this way, but this stops the tubers getting damaged by frost, or going green in sunlight. It also produces longer stems for bigger yields.
So, every time you see green shoots poke out the top, cover with another layer of compost, water and feed. The next time you see shoots, repeat, and so on, until you’ve filled the bag with compost. Harvest 10-12 weeks later by simply pulling one or two out of the bag, as and when you need them.
Soak up the nutrients
While nutritionists and dieticians tell us to eat more veg, sadly potatoes have never counted towards our five-a-day thanks to their high starch levels. But while they may not count towards your five-a-day, that doesn’t mean they are not nutritious. As underground roots, potatoes store all their vitamins and minerals in the tuber. They are full of potassium, which is key for healthy blood pressure and one skin-on potato will deliver 1,000mg, which is more than a banana.
Choose a red potato such as ‘Highland Burgundy Red’ and you’re getting even more antioxidants. The longer a potato is in the ground the more nutrients they store, so a homegrown maincrop will always win in the vitamin stakes.
And, as anyone who has plucked a juicy and firm potato from soil to kitchen in one afternoon will tell you – freshness is the key to nutrients and to flavour.
The joy of growing your own is you can experiment with flavoursome varieties. ‘Spanish Agria’, ‘King Edward’, ‘Russett’ and long, oval ‘Pentland Dell’ are all good choices. But you could also try ‘Cara’, with its distinctive pink ‘eyes’ and ‘Yukon Gold’, for its buttery, bright yellow flesh. These are varieties you simply can’t buy in the shops. Their low yields mean they are commercially redundant, but grown at home in small parcels they offer unrivalled texture and taste.
While nutritionists and dieticians tell us to eat more veg, sadly potatoes have never counted towards our five-a-day thanks to their high starch levels.
Alice Whitehead writes regularly for national and digital media on health, wellness, sustainability and gardening. Follow her on Instagram @allotmentalice or visit her website at www.allotmentalice.co.uk