I cut down the tops of my potatoes a few weeks ago because they were showing signs of blight. The infected plants were collected up and taken offsite to the local household recycling place where they have a hot composting system. After waiting a while for any blight spores on the surface of the soil to die, I enlisted the help of Mr Geoff, good friend of the Greedy Gardener household, to lift them. I’ve been saving feed chicken feed sacks to store them in and had a good number of them, having high hopes after last year’s bumper crop.
Sadly, the crop is roughly half the yield of last year’s so we only filled two sacks. I think the low yield is down to low light levels which have meant the plants didn’t do as well as they have previously. The wet summer has meant that there was little scab on the skins but the slugs have had a field day. The purple Arran Victory variety were selected for their slug and blight resistance but I have to say they don’t seem to have stood up to either any better than the others. On the plus side, the skins are tight and the tubers firm so they should be good keepers. I made some potato salad with them yesterday and they were OK but it remains to be seen whether their flavour is on a par with King Edwards for mash, chips and roasties.
The long knobbly ones are Anya, similar to Pink Fir Apple but less of a pain to scrub. I’ve grown these for several years now and they’re good used small in salads etc or kept over winter - they are particularly good for Pommes Dauphinoise.
The yellowish oval variety on the right are Charlottes - we’ve been digging these since July when they were tiny and they are a superb salad potato straight from the ground but also store well. They’re more waxy than the other two, excellent in a Spanish omelette or roast in slices with tomatoes, onions and olive oil.
