Waste Not Want Not

Okay. I feel better now. I was just sitting down to do this entry when I thought : Did you know that potatoes do not have the same shelf life as a twinkie? They don't! I did not know this.

I do now.

I went and visited with my potatoes and was shocked that despite being stored in a grocery bag in the basement that they had insisted on aging, some had even gone bad! I had fermenting potatoes down there and didn't know it. Now all the weirdness in the basement makes sense now, everything down there was drunk off their asses! A lot of things make sense now.

So I had to make some tough decisions . Some had to go and go far and go now. Ick. Some were kind of okay and some were more than okay - the all blues were the champion's, as advertised. They are a "late season" variety and  have a much longer shelf life than the early and mid season spuds. Late Season but  not all season .

The ones that were kind of okay agreed to take part in an experiment: I planted them, I threw away the soggy with growths but saved the ones with growths that were still solid but not really fit consumption . These guys were not going into the pot regardless so its not a real loss and in a couple of months I might end up with more spuds. This is why you grow your own, they aren't chemically treated like store bought and they are eligible  to grow up to  become Seed Potatoes.

Since I planted a variety of spuds I'm just going to harvest them in mass around New Years , roughly 73 days from when they were planted which is plenty of time for new potatoes and possibly some fully mature spuds as well , some will be more mature than others but I'll have fresh new potatoes. It will take some care along the way, covering them when it gets really cold, adding dirt  as needed, but it will be interesting to see if my experiment works.

The handful of survivors sat on my counter for a couple of days, aging. I finally decided it was kind of a do or die thing for them and I needed to do something. So I did. I made mashed potatoes! I realized I had  a lot of garlic and some real butter and while I didn't have milk, I did have heavy cream - it was frozen, but still good. I just defrosted it and added it in.

The handful of leftovers didn't make much, but they made enough that I can dine on lovely lavender mashed potatoes for the next few days