Volunteers of Oakland #5

I once asked a friend who was encouraging me to grow potatoes exactly why I would want to do such a thing. Her reply: "Do you like Easter egg hunts?" I couldn't really answer because it had been such a long time since I had gone foraging for colored eggs. But I do now grow potatoes and understand better what she was getting at.

So what happens when one of those potatoes does a better job of hiding than you do of finding?

That potato stays in the ground and freely grows yet more potatoes (perhaps out of sheer loneliness?).  And we are rewarded with fresh roasted potatoes for dinner.

Salt Potatoes

Early June Harvest
Purple Viking Potatoes

Last month I dug up the Purple Viking potatoes which I had planted in February. I hadn't planted many, so I didn't expect many. Only I got many - many little one, that is. Very unusual for Purple Vikings, which are known to produce "lunkers" (large, over-sized potatoes).

What to do? Reaching back into my upstate New York heritage, I came up with salt potatoes. It wasn't something that we were served regularly growing up, but it is one of those rare regional dishes from upstate New York.*

When asked about salt potatoes, my mom wrote:

"The first time I had salt potatoes was when we went camping at Grass Point along the St. Lawrence and Dad and I left you kids with Grandma for the day while we went to a pre-NY State Fair clambake for communication folks, reporters, etc. in 1962. There was clam chowder (delicious), clams on the half shell and bowls of tiny salty potatoes with melted butter poured over.

Elsie (Grandma) Deegan
1900 - 1998

At the time you couldn’t even buy raw salt potatoes in the store so no one could make their own…..unless you had a crop like mine!! And they were really good tasting.

[One of the few crops that my mom can't seem to grow is potatoes.]

Grandma told me that when she was young in Tarrytown, little potatoes were called pig potatoes and mostly fed to pigs. At her corner store, pig potatoes were 2 CENTS a pound and all the poor folks bought them and served them with the skins on. She said her family ate a lot of them for years."

*In my experience, should you say that you are from "upstate New York" people imagine Yonkers, or perhaps the Catskill Mountains (100+ miles from NYC). Alternatively, they lock onto Buffalo, at the very western tippy-tip of the state.  Well folks, it's about 350 miles from the eastern edge of the state - the Hudson River - to the western border at Lake Erie. At one point, that was the western frontier of this nation.

Updates: #4

Who is that pair of handsome dudes, anyway? Oh yes, I recognize them as those Alcatraz comic book men, signing copies of their collaborative efforts at Escapist Comics, and looking pretty pleased with the world.

The Purple Viking potatoes - planted in February and harvested in May - have once again performed well. As in 10 full pounds of well. Yumm...

And, well yes, the artichoke did something too, obviously something pretty, but not enough for bragging.

Mom came for a visit, and together we hit every nursery, botanical garden and flower tour in the region. Her favorite: Annie's Annuals, although somehow she didn't quite manage to spend all of her gift certificate. I guess it will keep until next time.

And Princess just waited for everyone to shut up, go home and let her get on with the business of stalking those pesky squirrels.

*******

Oh yeah, and what about that upset result from the Virginia primary? Did too many, or too few, voters turn out for Eric Cantor? Just shows to go ya, someone's gotta vote, and it probably should be you.

What's That in the Composter?

I still have, and even use, that old black plastic composting bin which Alameda County used to make available at a deeply discounted price. And every so often I go through and harvest its rewards to use in the garden. This is one of those times, since I need that compost for hilling up those Purple Viking potatoes (planted in February) and getting the tin tubs ready for baby lettuces.

But you never quite know what else will show up, mixed in with the compost. Round here, it's usually just millions and millions of little red worms, shiny black beetles, roly-polies and the occasional ensatina salamander.  Sometimes though, there are some true surprises:

The soup spoon that went missing months (or was it years?) ago.

Or Princess, the helpful garden cat.*

* Honest. I did not stage this photo. She is a cat and, as such, just wanted to be part of the activities.

The Very Last of the Last-Ones-on-the-Vine

Photo taken on December 5, 2013 

Given just how cold my tootsies have been this past week, it's pretty apparent that our lovely, long drawn-out Indian summer is finally over. Dang. And no rain in the forecast, either.

Anything that is going to keep growing this winter will just have to be happy tucked in under those row covers.

Purple Viking potatoes harvested on December 10, 2013

So who likes freezing? The Top Hat blueberry went all pink in the cold weather.

Photo taken on December 14, 2013

The Other Potato

The rest of the potato story (I just knew you couldn't wait):

In addition to the Augustas, I planted Purple Vikings. They took longer to grow, and didn't produce quite as much (for each pound planted, I got only about eleven pounds back... which is still damn good by all counts). And they took a little longer to mature (110 days or so). But these babies were crowd pleasers.

All of my taste testers, with the exception of my best guy at home, preferred the Purple Vikings. Not by much, mind you, but still.  They were mashed, baked, roasted, cut up into potato salad, even turned into French fries (You can fry food at home? Who knew? I thought you had to eat out for that pleasure), and then gobbled down. No problems there.

Their other advantages: They are pretty fellas - purpley-pink on the outside and and bright white on the inside (you'd think that an eight-year-old girl had dressed them). And they store quite well.

There are only a few left in the box and I'm already looking forward to growing them again next season. Or rather, eating them.  Maybe even sharing them...

You Say Potatoes, I Say...

Bonanza!
Last winter, I bought five pounds of seed potatoes (little spudlets) from Fedco's Moose Tubers.  Half of them were "Augusta" potatoes, a Yukon Gold type. And goodness, did those potatoes ever go for the gold.

(The other 21/2 lbs were "Purple Viking, but more about them later.)

Most of the Augustas were planted in early April. They grew into beautiful, large, healthy plants with pretty flowers. They even came out with flashy seedpods that looked like little green tomatoes.

Three months later, I dug up the potatoes (forget about your manicure folks, this is dirty work). And the harvest was thirty-five lbs. of gorgeous potatoes. Big and little ones. All golden and tender. And all organic, meaning expensive to buy but very safe to eat.

"Best roasted potatoes, ever," was the quote at home. Yup, my spud-loving, best guy was happy, very happy. But where do you put all them 'taters in a little bungalow? Under the bed?

Answer: Eat them. Share them - with friends, family, neighbors, your barber, your dentist and whoever is around and might appreciate them. But insist that they tell you how the potatoes were prepared, and whether they tasted better than regular ol' potatoes.  Surprise, surprise, everyone quickly cooked them up and said "yes!" But really, what are you gonna say to free, home-grown potatoes?  Especially organic ones.

OK, small print time. There is a fair amount of dirty work involved in growing potatoes - literally, someone has to haul buckets of dirt or compost to pile up around those plants as they grow. And these potatoes were totally boo-booed: they were hilled three times; grown without chemical help; and lived on a drip watering system. But the payoff was enormous - typically, you can expect one lb. of seed potatoes to produce 5 - 10 lbs. of harvest. I got a lot  more - almost thirty-eight lbs. of Augustas alone. And did I mention that they really tasted wonderful?

Would I do it again? I plan to. The Augusta potato was a big winner. I'm saving some of the tubers and will re-plant them in February or March, but on a smaller scale. Gotta leave some room for their cousins, the San Marzano tomatoes.

P.S. I would never have even considered growing potatoes in my teeny backyard without the encouragement of my sister Jane and my friend Sarah.