"Vegetables of Interest"

Red Pontiac Potatoes

Red Pontiac Potatoes

(Solanum tuberosum)

It’s the Fourth of July and time to dig potatoes.  Actually, its past time.   I planted my short row of Red Pontiacs around the first of April.  The variety matures about 80 days from planting which means I’m about ten days late.  Lateness is something you get used to when farming.

The time it takes for a potato to mature isn’t something we think about as consumers but it was a bottleneck as potatoes traveled from their origin in South America to Europe.   Its apparent that many selections were made as the potato moved up from the Spanish-controlled Canary Islands into Northern Europe.  The short growing seasons in the North required varieties with more rapid growth.  Luckily, potatoes have a relatively high rate of spontaneous mutations affecting color, skin type, shape and maturation times.  Careful observation combined with the ability to reproduce “true-to-type” offspring via the use of tubers made for the rapid establishment of many potato varieties.  English plantsmen were particularly fastidious about potato maturation times classifying the spread of differing types as “first earlies”,  “second earlies”, “mains” and “late mains.”

Potato varieties have also been developed by cross pollination.  The original or “regular” Pontiac potato was developed in the late 1930s as a cross between an old English potato named “Triumph” and a Maine potato called  “Katahdin.”  I’ve never seen the regular Pontiac but it is described as having white flesh as did its parents but with a buffed reddish skin similar to Triumph.  The “Red Pontiac” selection with its bright red skin came out as a mutation found in Southern field tests in the early 1940s.

I like several things about the Red Pontiac potato aside from its interesting pedigree.  In particular, I like its imperfections.  If grown to maturity the tubers vary in size and shape.  They are mostly round but oblong ones show up too.  The surface of the spud is dotted with shallow eyes and subtle nobs that don’t quite become noses.  In short, these potatoes look like they have character in comparison to the perfectly shaped, winkle-free Burbank bakers.

Our modern day obsession with vegetable appearances is sad and uninformed but it isn’t new.  In the 16th century there arose a theory called the “Doctrine of Signatures” that prescribed plant materials as ‘herbals’.  The Doctrine held that plants resembling a human malady in some respect would be helpful in its cure.  For example, red beet juice could help cure blood ailments.  Walnuts were good for scalp wounds and so forth.  In the case of potatoes Doctrine writings concluded that the numerous ‘growths’ on the surface of many potatoes suggested a sinister connection to leprosy and they strongly advised against its consumption. 

For those among you who have the courage to ignore 16th century mystical thinking, the Red Pontiac potato will reward you.  Its thin skin has a beautiful ‘crunch’ when braised.  And the waxy flesh makes a great mash.  The flavor?  “Happiness increased” is how John Foster described potatoes in 1664.  True then.  True now.

C Lindquist
Vegetables of Interest, 2009

Bintje Potatoes

Bintje Potatoes

(Solanum tuberosum)

The Dutch are my kind of people.  There are about 16 million of them living in a country about the size of Maryland.  Their birth rate is below the level needed to maintain the population so they are voluntarily thinning the herd.  But even more impressive is the factoid that the Dutch have more than 150 varieties of potatoes with some presence in their produce markets.  To my knowledge you have to go back to the original stomping ground of the potato in South America to find that many potato varieties (Peru has ~3,000).  Compare that with the United States where 90% of our potatoes come from fewer than twelve varieties.  And need we mention that Americans are producing far more little Americans than we need or who are welcome?

But this missive is about potatoes and specifically an heirloom Dutch variety called “Bintje” (Pronounced “ben-jee”).     “Bintje” or “Miss Bintje” as it was known at its introduction in 1910 was the work of a botanist schoolmaster named Kornelis Friesland.   Master Friesland used potatoes as a hands-on teaching tool in his classroom to illustrate the principles of plant genetics and cross breeding.  He named each resulting hybrid potato after one of his children of which he had nine.  But when he produced the tenth hybrid potato in ~1905 (a cross between Munstersen and Fransen) he found inspiration in his best pupil, Miss Bintje Jansma.  And one might say that the rest of the story is “potato history.”

Today Bintje potatoes are the most widely grown yellow-fleshed potato in the world.  Farmers appreciate Bintje’s productivity and its tolerance to a wide range of soils.   Commercial produce firms like Bintje for its storage ability and its good looks.  Even on close inspection a Bintje is smooth and well rounded.  Plus its skin has a silk-like finish.  But where Bintje truly excels is in the kitchen.  Its starch solid content of ~20% puts it in the middle of the ‘wax vs flour’ spectrum and thus they can play either role.  And most important is that the flavor of a Bintje is exceptional.  Some describe it as having a unique light, nut-like flavor.   I don’t taste that note but I agree that it is an exceptional spud.

Despite Bintje’s world-wide reputation it is largely unknown in America.  Much of that may be due to America’s long-standing “potato color barrier.”  Until a Canadian university invented the Yukon Gold in the 1970s the American public wouldn’t look twice at a spud unless it had snow-white flesh.  But Yukon got a toehold in our market when restaurant chefs were intrigued by its “unusual look.”  Growers liked Yukon because they were huge (Remember that Americans nearly always think “Big food is better food.”)  And Yukon’s ultra-short growing season allow them to be planted nearly all the way North to the permafrost.  But the thorn-in-the-side issue with Yukon Gold is the taste.  Yukon is a pretty average-tasting potato.  And that’s on a good day.

So why hasn’t the exceptional Bintje beaten the pants off of Yukon Gold here in America?   It might be the size/productivity issues.  Or perhaps it is the economic phenomena of market dominance. I don’t know the answer to that mystery but I do know what the outcome would be if anyone does a potato tasting throw down between that yellow thing from Vancouver and the delicate, delightful Miss Bintje.

These Bintje potatoes were organically grown in my garden in the Valley of the Moon. 

C Lindquist
Vegetables of Interest, 2008

Green Mountain Potatoes

Green Mountain Potatoes
(Solanum tuberosum)



Green Mountain Potatoes were developed by Orson Alexander of Charlotte, Vermont in 1885.  Alexander and the University of Vermont developed a number of potato lines in response to the American potato blight of earlier years.  The parentage of Green Mountain is recorded as  Dunmore X Excelsior.  The plants are large with a fine display of white flowers.  They are, however, susceptible to a number of pests.

Green Mountain was grown extensively in the Eastern United States particularly in Maine until the 1950s.  It was displaced in the commercial market by oblong-shaped potatoes with  greater disease resistance.  Still, Green Mountain hangs on in small scale farms and in the gardens of potato cognocente.  It is prized for its exceptional flavor when baked or fried.

Recently Green Mountain potatoes have joined other historical vegetables and fruits on the Slow Foods “Ark of Taste” list.

These organically grown Green Mountain Potatoes were planted in my garden in the Valley of the Moon in early April .

Seed Source:      Moose Tubers
Waterville Maine, USA

C Lindquist
Vegetables of Interest, 2008

Cedar Potato 'Barrel'

A unique aspect of Maine potato farming at the turn of the century was the use of cedar barrels to collect the potatoes in the field.  Local cooperages in Aroostook County turned out barrels with cedar staves and ash hoops.  Each barrel (called a 'quarter') held 165 pounds of potatoes, which was the official unit of potato commerce in Maine until the late 1980s.   The use of cedar potato barrels has all but disappeared from Maine but a few Aroostook farmers still use them for harvest and short term storage.

The pictured  cedar potato 'barrel' was created expressly to hold heirloom Green Mountain Potatoes which was the principal variety grown in Aroostook for more than fifty years.  It was assembled at my farm in the Valley of the Moon using non-union labor, various materials and a mountain of imagination.

C Lindquist

Bandicoot Potatoes

Bandicoot Potatoes

(Being the adventures of a Hungry Farmer with a few too many Heirloom Potatoes and a bit less land than needed.*)

The plain truth* was that I was clearing a line for late summer melons when it become clear that there was no room* for a another hill of heirloom Garnet Chile Potatoes.  The solution or First Slice*, of course, was to bandicoot the hill of potatoes making room for a melon start.  To bandicoot a potato is a simple matter.  The soil surrounding the potato plant is moistened until it yields to probing trowel or hand.  The small, immature spuds near the surface are carefully harvested leaving their deeply positioned brethren to grow.

For readers of a certain age (5-100) and nationality (Australian) the phrase ‘bandicoot potatoes’ is instantly familiar if not evocative.  The bandicoot is a small marsupial resident of Australia.  Similar in appearance to a rat and armed with the foraging bravado of a pig bandicoots are famed villains in the Australian garden.  Bandicoots are said to sense the first moment when a sweet potato can be dug or a melon’s debut to sweetness.  Their larcenous, sly habits are immortalized in Australian slang.  To “bandicoot” is to steal but with a touch of flair and skill.

Much like Walt Disney’s animal creations the bandicoot has been given an anthropomorphic makeover in Australian literature and art.  He’s a quick-thinking thief and liar but not an altogether a bad guy.  He has his reasons and malice isn’t one of them.  The bandicoot in Norman Lindsay’s The Magic Pudding is the cornerstone creation in the Aussie imagination.  The 1918 children’s classic documents the travels of three characters on a journey in the company of a magical pudding that can be eaten without being consumed.  The pudding is soon stolen while the characters fight would-be thieves and one another when not breaking into song or verse.  We first meet ‘The Bandicoot’ in Lindsay’s brilliant drawings that accompany the text.  The Bandicoot is holding a stolen watermelon so large that we can only see his legs.  The subsequent interrogation of the bandicoot by Bill Barnacle is a sublime “cop-meets-criminal” moment.  Bill is looking for the possum who has stolen his Magic Pudding.  The Bandicoot doesn’t initially grasp that Bill’s interest in him is as a witness and not as a thief.  The bandicoot pulls out one lie and then another in an attempt to tell Bill what he wants to hear.  The exchange is deft, funny and as genuine as any reality cop show.

Bandicooting potatoes is not isolated to Australia.  Anyone forced to wait the full measure of a potato’s growth cycle can get hungry, particularly for the taste of a just-dug, “new potato.”  The time required for a potato to reach maturity varies by potato variety.  The English make distinctions between potatoes harvested at 12 weeks called “earlies” and those at 14 weeks called “seconds.”  Earlies are dug before flowering.  They are small with very fragile skins.  Seconds are dug just after flowering and are a bit larger but still with loads of ‘new potato’ flavor.  “Mains” are potatoes left 16 weeks or longer in the ground.  Mains are fully mature spuds with thickened skins ready for storage.

The ‘new potatoes’ we find in American produce aisles are faint images of a just-dug, bandicooted potato.   The ubiquitous bright red “creamer potato” is usually a modern variety bred for its appearance.  Cherry Red is popular here in California.  They are a ‘seconds’ potato dug early for smaller size and then misted under refrigeration until you buy them months later.  If they taste like new potatoes its purely an accident.

Any good potato is worth bandicooting if you can manage it.  Gardeners with foresight can make the steal easier by mixing straw with the soil when they ‘hill’ the potato plants shortly after emerging.  Hilling encourages spud formation near the soil surface and the straw makes fast work of the digging.  I particularly like bandicoot Red Lasoda potatoes.  If there is a more delicious new potato than Red Lasoda, I’ve not grown it.

The photograph shows the results of my potato larceny of a Garnet Chile hill.  I’ve written a long story about Garnet Chile a year ago but I can’t say that it stimulated much interest in them.  Perhaps people are still gaga over fingerlings.  Fingerlings are a fine choice for a wax type but there’s a bigger world of potato taste out there besides fingerlings and the fraudulent Yukon Gold.

It’s a sad puzzle that potatoes have sunk to an anonymous generic in the American market.  Marketers have taught us to prefer white-fleshed potatoes because they appeal to some notion of sanitation and purity.  We’ve bred potatoes to have smooth surfaces because we think that the ‘eyes’ are imperfections.  We refrigerate and drug our potatoes to prevent them from aging naturally.  And the largest consumer of potatoes in America has placed dimensional requirements on potatoes so that they yield the largest number of fries over 4 inches in length.  We seem to have every notion about a potato except taste.

But finding the ‘true taste’ of a potato is not a simple affair.  De Gaulle once commented, “Very important affairs never have a single answer.”  I think he was speaking about potatoes.  Much like Lindsay’s Magic Pudding potatoes can taste like potatoes unless they taste like something else.  In adept, sensitive hands the potato can suggest a tender spring moment while another pose can mimic stolid winter nourishment.  They can be a star or a foil.  Dairy is a favored partner but a naked flour potato baked in ashes can be a revelation.  The potato is a culinary chameleon adept in starkly different roles but always recognizable as a warm, fulfilling presence.  Perhaps bandicoot potatoes were in Norman Lindsay’s mind when Bill Barnacle the sailor observered  “There’s nothing this Puddin’ enjoys more than offering slices of himself to strangers.”

These bandicoot potatoes were organically grown in my garden in the Valley of the Moon.

C Lindquist
Vegetables of Interest, 2008

*  Phrasing suggested by N. Lindsay, 1918, The Magic Pudding

Green Mountain Potato Flowers

Green Mt. Potato Flowers

In 1769 an apprentice apothecary named Antoine Parmentier entered a contest supported by the French government to find a “food substance capable of reducing the calamities of famine.”  Through much of the 17th and 18th centuries France suffered from periodic famines prompted by crop failures, particularly those involving wheat.  The French daily diet was largely bread-based with modest supplementation from dairy, fruit and meat.  Failures of wheat crops were common as were the consequent famines.

Parmentier’s proposed addition to the French diet was controversial but one based on his personal experience.  He had spent a greater portion of his service in the French army of Louis XVth as a prisoner of war in Germany.  There he was fed a steady diet of potatoes which were cheap and simple fare in Germany but only considered fit for swine by the French.   Parmentier, however, developed an appreciation for potatoes and conducted a variety of experiments with them after his safe return to France.  He became convinced that potatoes were an excellent food of “a delicate and flavorful nature”.

Parmentier’s 1769 proposal was to introduce potatoes into the French garden as an attractive flower and as food.   His entry won the contest and the interest of the new French king, Louis XVI.   Soon after Parmentier’s win the Queen of France wore potato flowers both as ornament and as a ploy to induce the production of potatoes.

Nearly everyone now appreciates Parmentier’s culinary foresight but few recall his appreciation for the potato’s neat habit and attractive flowers.   Attached is a reminder.  These are Green Mountain Potato flowers that are showing their best in my garden in the Valley of the Moon.  Green Mountain is an American heirloom potato that has fallen out of commercial production but never out of favor with Maine potato buffs.  It is a vigorous plant with handsome leaves and bright, confident flowers.  If so inclined you can wear a sprig of flowers and keep up with the fashion of a French queen.  And in a few week’s time you can dine on fare fit for a French king. 

Merci, Parmentier!

C Lindquist
Vegetables of Interest, 2008

Rose Finn Apple Fingerling Potatoes

Rose Finn Apple Fingerling Potatoes (aka “Rose Fir”)

(Solanum tuberosum)


   
    Rose Finn Apple potatoes are an heirloom English spud that was little known in America until the recent surge of interest in the fingerling market.  It has a distinctive pink thin skin and yellow flesh.  Its shape is long, thin and very “knobby” particularly when the plant is stressed.  Its weird, ‘non-potato’ shapes are reminiscent of that seen with the historic and ill-fated “Lumper” potato from Ireland.
    The taste of Rose Finns has often been described as “unique” with modifiers such as “nutty” or “fruity.”  Their culinary use seems to be fairly broad:  steamed, roasted, or baked since they fall between the two poles of waxy/mealy. 
    From a gardening perspective Rose Finns are a lovely upright plant with attractive white flowers.   The organic gardening pioneer Alan Chadwick was very fond of Rose Finns, writing that it was his favorite spud.  As with many Chadwick stories there was a dramatic chapter of its being smuggled into America by Chadwick himself so that it might be planted at Santa Cruz.    
    These Rose Finns were organically grown in my garden in Kenwood with little drama.

C Lindquist

La Ratte Fingerling Potatoes

La Ratte Fingerling Potatoes…. “La Difference”

(Solanum tuberosum)



The differences between the Americans and the French can be illustrated in a single dish that everyone knows:  whipped potatoes.   

On this side of the Atlantic whipped potatoes are prepared by boiling anonymous potatoes in water until they are soft.   Using the easiest method at hand, the potatoes are then whipped. Additions of an idiosyncratic amount of hot milk and a whimsical wedge of butter are made while tending to other tasks in the kitchen.   When everything is mixed you are done.  Serve. 

The French, however, begin with a history lesson:  One first contemplates the contrasting meanings of "La Puree de Pommes de Terre" for the peasant class vs. the aristocracy.    In the kitchens of the poor "La Puree" was a simple dish enriched by the restrained use of precious butter and milk.   But for the rich "La Puree" was a chance to show off food bling.  The liberal use of butter and refined cooking techniques elevated grandmother's sturdy potato dish into the realm of a light, ethereal essence.

Thus the process of making whipped potatoes in France begins with a philosophic question:  are you a simple, close-to-the-earth peasant or are you a person of refined tastes and ample means?   There is no morally correct answer to this question but culinary hell awaits those who try and straddle it.

La Ratte potatoes enter this story as the darling, potato-of-choice in the "La Puree Pomme de Robuchon” recipe by a modern and famous French chef, Joel Robuchon.  The dish can be described as the union of potato and butter in the body of a light but luxuriant sauce.  It has inspired as many “wows” from critics as it has professional chefs to re-create the dish in their own restaurants. On its surface the dish is seductively simple yet it is technically challenging to execute perfectly. Despite several published versions of “tell-all” Robuchon recipes both the ingredients and the process remain uncertain and slightly mysterious.  In regards to the potatoes most sources and Robuchon himself cite La Ratte fingerlings as “the potato.”  To gardeners, however, this seems an odd choice given that La Ratte is a waxy spud that is prone to becoming gummy in a puree. But Robuchon acolytes defend his choice of potato claiming it to be his version of a culinary handicap that showcases his superlative technique.  His critiques respond by hinting that he may actually use a floury potato, BF15, which is common in France.  They claim the La Ratte suggestion is a smoke screen intended to sabotage his competition.  You may choose to believe it or not but these kinds of debates fill culinary blogs and keep some people up at night.

Whether you are tempted to scale the heights of Robuchon’s whipped potatoes or not La Ratte remains a fine potato with a long history.  Its genetics suggest that is a ‘New World” potato that came out of 18th century European crosses.  Legend more than record suggests it was grown in France for a long time before being lost in the late 1800s.  It was re-introduced to France from the Alps in the early 1900s and has been a small-scale agricultural item since that time. At present its grown primarily around Burgundy but its recent fame has encouraged larger production outside the region.

In the United States La Rattes have captured the imagination of several high-end chefs, including Thomas Keller and Charlie Trotter.  Commercially a selection of La Ratte called  “Princess La Ratte” is making the rounds but its distributor hasn’t offered evidence of its genetic provenance or of its improvements over open pollinated stock.

My experience with La Ratte is only a few seasons deep but I have grown both open stock and the “Princess” selection.   I have also attempted Robuchon’s whipped potatoes several times.  I don’t have the training of a French chef nor do I own a proper tamis but I ate the results with relish.  If anyone wants my recipe I will sell you a few La Ratte potatoes plus vague and slightly mysterious instructions about growing them.  I might be different than the French but I can learn.

C Lindquist

Garnet Chili Potatoes

(Solanum tuberosum)

Buried in the 1873 edition of The Horticulturist and Journal of Rural Art and Rural Taste is a very peculiar description of Rev. Chauncey E. Goodrich.  Without elaboration it described the Reverend has having “…such a delicate constitution that he cannot eat a potato.”  Presumably the small readership of the Horticulturist was well acquainted with Goodrich and many understood what this literary wink implied.  But, alas, we are clueless. We are left to wonder why Rev. Chauncey E Goodrich couldn’t eat a potato including one called ‘Garnet Chili’ that he created and that changed the world.

Chauncey E Goodrich was an Episcopalian minister in Upstate New York.  He came from a well-connected and well-educated New England family.  Many of his uncles and cousins held prominent positions in government or academics.  His first cousin, also a “Chauncey Goodrich,” held a prominent position at Yale. Chauncey E., however, appears to have been the only Goodrich to wear the collar.  We know little about his career in the church but his hobby, growing potatoes, is another matter.

In the summer of 1842 farmers around Philadelphia experienced a disastrous and inexplicable loss of their potato crop.  The potatoes sprouted and grew normally but in mid-season their leaves developed ‘dead spots’ that quickly engulfed the plant. Tubers still forming in the ground were reduced to a putrid smelling mush.

The following summer the mysterious potato affliction appeared again and it spread across New England in 1844 presumably darkening the garden gate of the Rev. Goodrich’s potato patch.  The term “late blight” was generally used but “potato rot” was a frequent alternative.  The sciences of plant pathology and microbiology were nonexistent at the time but several theories were brought forward to explain the phenomena.  One concept supported by Goodrich in 1847 was called “degeneracy.”  This theory held that potatoes were loosing “vitality” during their ~100 years of cultivation in North America.  They proposed to solve the problem by re-introducing “vigorous, native potatoes” from South America to cross with the enfeebled American crop.

In 1850 Goodrich obtained several potato cultivars from Chili via a contact in the American embassy in Panama.  One of the cultivars was labeled “Rough Purple Chili.”  Its not known what strains Goodrich crossed with Rough Purple Chili but by 1853 he had a potato like no other.  “Garnet Chili” was a vigorous potato producing large yields of large round white-fleshed tubers of “excellent quality.” 

Goodrich’s new red potato was an instant success.  Within a short time another amateur potato grower, Albert Bresee of Hubbardton Vermont, produced a slew of other varieties using Garnet Chili as parent stock.  Bresee’s most famous potato, Early Rose, soon became the most widely grown potato in America as fields were replanted with “new and vigorous” potatoes that they assumed were immune from late blight.

One gardener that planted a crop of Early Rose was Luther Burbank’s mother.  Although Burbank was a teenager at the time he took quick note of his mother’s crop of potatoes and noted that one potato plant produced seed from its flowers.  Intrigued by this unusual event Burbank planted all 23 seeds the next year and found one plant that produced even larger yields of big oblong potatoes.  The “Burbank Russet” was discovered.

The development of DNA fingerprinting has allowed researchers to trace the remarkable story of potato genetics from Goodrich’s work in 1850 to the present day.  The Garnet Chili potato contributed over half of the genetics to Burbank’s Russet.  And it is significantly related to over 150 potato varieties now planted across North America and Europe.  In short, Chauncey E Goodrich’s work in his backyard garden produced a genetic taproot for nearly all ‘modern potatoes’ grown today.

And what of the’ late blight’ that inspired Rev. Goodrich’s work?  The potato blight first seen in 1841 was very likely transported from America to Europe via potato exports to Belgium where it spread across the continent.  In 1845 the first outbreak in Ireland wiped out 70-80% of the potato crop that 3 million people depended upon for survival.  Subsequent outbreaks of blight over the next decade plunged Ireland into starvation and millions died.  The cause of the disease was debated for nearly fifteen years with prominent scientists taking differing views until a German scientist used a new method of proof called “Koch’s postulates” demonstrated that a small transmissible fungus was to blame.  It was quickly shown that Garnet Chile is quite vulnerable to the fungus.

These Garnet Chili potatoes were organically grown in my garden in the Valley of the Moon.  It is suggested that they be served with a sense of history and a light dressing of mayonnaise such as found in lobster potato salad.  Rev. Goodrich had one thing right.  They are of “excellent quality.”

C Lindquist

Ozette Fingerling Potatoes

Ozette Fingerling Potatoes

(Solanum tuberosum subsp. Andigena)

Ozette fingerling potatoes have recently achieved minor celebrity status.  They have been named to the "Ark of Taste" by the Slow Food movement and a Google search for "Ozette potatoes" returns with 761 hits.  They might be rare but they are not unknown.

It is generally accepted that Ozette is a very old if not the oldest North American potato.  They have been grown by generations of Makah Indians and play an important role in their culture.   Its history is repeated nearly word-for-word by numerous sources.  The Slow Food website is typical:

"The Ozette came from Peru by way of Spanish explorers to the Makah
Indians at Neah Bay , Washington in the late 1700s.  The Ozette is also
known by the names, Anna Cheeka's Ozette and Makah Ozette…..The
potato has an earthy and nutty flavor that is similar to the taste
sensed in cooked dry beans.  The flesh is firm and the texture is very
creamy. …..The Ozette is grown predominantly in private gardens for
specialty menus and for personal consumption."

The description is largely accurate but the 1700s Peruvian connection is in doubt.   Ozette's glamorous history has attracted the interest of potato geneticists who have used gene mapping in an attempt to trace its history.  One group at the 2005 Plant & Animal Genome Conference seemed to deliver good news/bad news.   The good news is that Ozettes are substantially different from modern potato strains developed in the 18th century.  The bad news is that they aren't closely related to native Andean potatoes either.   If the 1700 Peru story were true one would have expected such a linkage.  The one strong but ambiguous genetic hit of their findings was Ozettes were closely related to a very old potato grown by native Alaskans called "Maria."

Happily one doesn’t need a degree in genetics to see that Ozette potatoes are something different.   The tubers are small and although irregularly shaped they are roughly longer than wide with blunt ends.   Sometimes botanists refer to this shape as "lingot-shaped" or in French "ingot d'or" suggesting the similarity to gold nuggets.   Occasionally you will find tubers that have fused creating a "Y" or "V" shaped spud.  The surface of an Ozette tuber is blemished by numerous shallow  triangular shaped 'eyes' giving it a wavy appearance.   A single Ozette plant will yield tubers of different sizes and shapes.  This characteristic is deeply frowned upon by the commercial potato industry which classifies Ozette as having "very poor grade out."

Poor grades are in the eye of the beholder.  In the garden Ozettes are a gem of a plant.   They are tough and will grow in good times and in bad.  Their yield might be modest and the tubers irregular but they will produce enough for the table and a sufficiency for planting next year.

At the table Ozette fingerlings have many enthusiasts who claim it to be the “best tasting fingerling.”   Personally I find that descriptions of  "the best tasting potato" are like reading about “the best tasting wine” but with a vocabulary of four adjectives instead of hundreds.  "Nutty," "buttery," "creamy" and "potato-y" are about the extent of the potato world’s vocabulary.   My suggestion is to try a freshly dug Ozette that has been perfectly roasted.  As you slowly savor its taste you might consider adding a fifth adjective to your personal potato lexicon: "perfect."

These Ozette fingerlings were grown organically in my garden in the Valley of the Moon. They were planted in mid-March and they are being dug now.

C Lindquist