potatoes

Potatoes are a New World root vegetable in the nightshade family. All green parts of the plant are poisonous. That is why potatoes should be stored in the dark. In sunlight, they turn green and become dangerous to eat.

Since potatoes were introduced in Europe, they have become a staple food to the extent that bad harvest years are known to have caused famines.

a. growing potatoes at home

2014-2015

The most important is to plant only disease-free planting potatoes. If you plant store-bought food potatoes, you're guaranteed to contaminate your potato patch with blight disease.

Potatoes never did very well for me here in the NM desert. The temperate growing season isn't long enough to form large tubers. Once the summer heat hit, potatoes died off and went dormant.

INGREDIENTS

This is what you need:

disease-free planting potatoes
preferably a temperate climate
heavy fertile soil

Pic1: potato harvest from compost heap potatoes

Directions

Work the soil fine. A hard soil produces weird potato shapes.
Plant the potatoes 8-10" deep. They have enough reserves to form long shoots, and long underground shoots produce more potatoes.
Harvest shortly after the potato plants die off.
Leave the potatoes on top to dry for a day or so.
Don't leave them longer or they'll turn green and won't be safe to eat.

2014

Pic2-4: 2014 growing potatoes on the compost heap

Pic5: 2015-06-06 — second-year potatoes
Pic6: 2017-02-25 — start potatoes early in a pot, then plant them deep
Pic7: 2015-04-05 — volunteer potato plant

b. boiled potatoes

This is probably the most common way of cooking potatoes.

See: boiled potatoes

Pic8: boiled potatoes
Pic9: tossed potatoes
Pic10: served, boiled vs. deep-fried

c. mashed potatoes

See: mashed potatoes

Pic11: boiled potatoes, tossed
Pic12: mashing the potatoes
Pic13: smoother with milk and nutmeg

d. baked potatoes

See: baked potatoes.

2019-10-21

Pic14: bake
Pic15: add butter
Pic16: served

e. pan-fried potatoes

Before pan- or deep-frying potatoes, boil or at least parboil them. Pan-fried raw potatoes won't cook properly and don't taste very good because they cannot absorb salt like they do when boiling in water.

See: pan-fried potatoes

2019-09-05