Grow potatoes from whole potatoes, small potatoes, or a cut piece of a larger potato. Potatoes grow from the dormant buds–called “eyes”–on the surface of other potatoes. When the buds sprout, they develop into new plants. About two weeks after sprouting, the main stem and first leaves of the new potato plant will appear above ground. Potato Growing Tips:…
Tuber Vegetables
Sweet Potatoes: Short-Summer Varieties
Sweet potatoes in 100 days! Sweet potatoes started from slips–rooted sprouts–purchased at the garden center or from a seed catalog can be harvested in about 100 days, even less. Short-season sweet potato varieties include ‘Beauregard’, ‘Centennial’, and ‘Georgia Jet.’ These three planted from slips will be ready for harvest in 80 to 90 days. Varieties…
How to Grow Sweet Potatoes
Sweet potatoes are a tender, warm-season perennial plant grown as an annual. • Set sweet potato starts or slips in the garden after all danger of frost has passed in spring, usually 4 weeks after the last average frost date. • Sweet potatoes grow best where the air temperature remains very warm, from 75° to…
How to Grow Sunchoke
The sunchoke, also called Jerusalem artichoke, is a variety of perennial sunflower grown for its edible low-starch tuber which looks much like a small potato but tastes like a water chestnut. Sunchoke tubers can be planted in the garden as early as 2 to 3 weeks before the average last frost date in spring. They…
Yellow Potato Side Dish and Soup
Yellow potatoes like ‘Yukon Gold’ and ‘Yellow Finn’ are ideal for boiling and using in salads and gratins or adding raw to stews. They are moist with a dense flesh and low in starch which means they will hold their shape cooked. You can boil yellow potatoes whole and unpeeled or cut and unpeeled or…
Yukon Gold Yellow Potato
Yellow potatoes are well suited for boiling, steaming, mashing, roasting, grilling, and au gratin dishes. ‘Yukon Gold’ is a stand-out yellow potato with a buttery-tasting flesh that you will want to try mashed, steamed, in soups and chowders, or made into potato pancakes. Because the ‘Yukon Gold’ brings its own buttery flavor to the table,…
Jicama: Kitchen Basics
Jicama snack time. Drizzle lime juice over thin jicama slices and sprinkle with chili-seasoned salt. Jicama is a squat, knobby, earth-colored root vegetable that resembles a turnip with an apple-like, nutty flavor. Its stark white flesh is cool and crunchy and perfect for eating out of hand after peeling. Jicama can be diced and added…
How to Cook a Potato
Potatoes are versatile in the kitchen. You can cook potaoes in so many ways–boil, bake, roast, fry, steam, mash, and stuff. You can serve a different potato dish every day of the week. Here’s a few potato cooking basics: Bake. Choose potatoes the same size so that they will cook evenly. Scrub unpeeled, pierce each…
Potatoes for Cooking
Potatoes can be round, oval, and smooth. They can have rough skins or smooth skins, white skins, brown skins, red skins or blue skins. There are more than 3,000 varieties of potatoes. But when it comes to cooking, there are only three kinds of potatoes: high starch, medium starch, and low starch. When you are…
Potato Types and Varieties
Which potato? When it comes to cooking potatoes, choose your potato for the style of cooking you have in mind. Use high starch potatoes for baking, frying, and mashing. Use medium starch potatoes for steaming, baking, roasting, grilling, and au gratin dishes. Use low starch potatoes for boiling, roasting, grilling, sautés, stews, salads, and au…