Kitchen Garden Blog

That moment when you lift your last forkful of potatoes and lay them out on the surface of the soil to dry off the skins for an hour or two before storing is a turning point in the veg-growing year. Soon after, the covers start to come out again, there is muck-spreading to be done and then the ground is tucked up for the winter.

Once again this year I have embarked on my search for the perfect potato: last year, the inaugural year of the Crocus Kitchen Garden Spud Awards, I grew eight varieties from first earlies to maincrops.

They included some really rubbish ones (‘Sharpe’s Express’, stand up and be counted: I grew them so you didn’t have to). And some spectacularly good ones: ‘Majestic’ was good enough to make the cut again this year, and I did want to grow ‘Kestrel’ again but they didn’t have any tubers when I was buying my seed potatoes.

This year, I again grew eight varieties; two I had already grown before, the remaining six were new to me. There has been a major change in the meantime, which probably if you’re a proper scientist makes the entire experiment null and void: I have moved from a heavy clay soil at the allotment to a light, chalky loam in a much damper area of the country.

This affects much about the performance of my potatoes, I’ve discovered. First of all, the chalk means they’re prone to scab: all the varieties I chose this year were advertised as having scab resistance (though some with more accuracy than others, as you’ll see).

Second, the yields were much higher, even though we had that drought-plagued spring and virtually no summer at all. I put this down to the massive difference in the natural water content of the soil: it’s changed everything I ever thought about how important it is to water.

The effect on the taste is less easy to quantify. But in any case, as I mentioned last year, all my conclusions are shamelessly subjective: something that grows well and tastes delicious in my soil could flail around pathetically and taste like yesterday’s dishwater in yours. So as before, although I would heartily recommend the ones that came out top, I wouldn’t exactly not recommend the ones that didn’t. If you know what I mean.

So: cue fanfare. Here, without further ado, is my verdict on the spuds of 2011.

Earlies:

Foremost: Oh my goodness, I am so regretting my selfless decision to stop growing ‘Duke of York’ under some ill-conceived idea that there might be something better out there. This sure isn’t it. About the only good things that can be said about it are that the yields were high, and so was the texture: on the waxy side of floury and held its shape well on cooking. Trouble is, you wouldn’t really want to actually cook it. Bland, watery: unexciting doesn’t even start to cover it.
Yield: generous, with very large tubers: would have been larger had the crop not been cut down by early blight
Flavour: Nope. Not a sausage. 
Verdict: 2/10
In a word: Uninspiring.

Accent: I never thought I would taste a good new potato again: and then I dug the first lot of these up. Wow. They have been the highlight of the year: buttery in colour and flavour with good-sized golden tubers and a melt-in-the-mouth texture. My, they were delicious: just that delicate-yet-rich flavour you expect from new potatoes. My mouth is watering at the memory. Only faults were a relatively low yield (the price you pay, I suppose); and early blight.
Yield: middling
Flavour: mmm-hmmm. Ooooh yes. Nom nom nom.
Verdict: 9/10
In a word: Tastetastic.

Second earlies:

Vivaldi: Well these were slim and elegant little lovelies: a bit of a surprise, to be honest, as I hadn’t expected pale golden elongated tubers, and they did look beautiful. The photo doesn’t do them justice: but I had to make do with photographing what was left as we’d eaten the slim ones while I was going to get the camera.

That’s because though some were quite large, with a good proportion of bakers, you paid for all that refinement with a super-low yield. What a shame: they were almost perfect, not even a few scabs, yet we ate the lot in about two or three meals. The other slight disappointment was the flavour: pleasant, but forgettable.
Yield: low: about 6kg from a 10ft row
Flavour: well…. OK. Ish. Could have done with being more memorable.
Verdict: 5/10
In a word: Elegant

British Queen: I will confess to growing this variety before: it was, in fact, my favourite second-early variety for years (before I discovered Kestrel last year: I’m afraid that one was very hard to beat and I would have grown it instead of British Queen if it was available).

Well: it’s still pretty good. I mean, it’s a reliable performer, with no scab even on my chalk and a respectable yield of medium-sized tubers despite the blight.

The one major fault of this variety for me, though, is that it disintegrates so easily on cooking. I can’t be doing with watery mash, and though I used to put up with it I’m now wiser and know there are such things as Kestrel second earlies which don’t do it.

Anyway: if you can get it to stay in one piece, you forgive it quite a lot for its wonderful flavour – tastes just as a potato should, rich, creamy and memorable, and for me the main reason it’s worth growing.
Yield: medium: about 9.3kg from a 10ft row
Flavour: fine, delicate, and utterly delicious 
Verdict: 7/10
In a word: Enjoyable

to be continued….

Tags: cooking, growing trials, harvest, heritage varieties, potatoes