How to grow potatoes in Canberra

The long, hot days are coming to an end and we are now in the middle of the harvest season. How have you fared with growing vegetables this past summer with the extremes of weather and temperature?

The humble potato is called the pomme de terre by the French, the apple of the ground. Long growing seasons apply to both potatoes and apples but this title suggests that the potato can be a very fine vegetable indeed.

From the 3000 varieties that are grown around the world, we planted just six varieties this year and we have nearly completed our harvest. Main commercial growers have been digging into their deep, rich loam soils and providing the markets with new season treasures for some weeks. The earlier you dig your potatoes, the thinner will be the skin. Keeping ability is limited but the flavour of the new season potato is something else.

It has taken us some 18-20 weeks from our plantings to arrive at the mature harvest. The plants produced very good bushes of leaves but the very hot days of mid summer did not help our production. In the end we averaged four to five potatoes a plant. This is around half the benchmark rate of 10 tubers a tuber planted. I use the pointed end of a small mattock for trawling through the soil around the potatoes. A garden fork is another option but you would need to press the tynes into the soil well away from the plant, to avoid spiking any large tubers.

One benefit of the past month of dry weather has been no rotting of the tubers in the ground. As with every vegetable grown in the home garden there can be many challenges before the final harvest. Should you have plenty of potatoes still growing in your garden, allow the flowers and vegetation to die off and only harvest what you need now. Leaving the remainder nestling in the garden bed is just perfect for long-term keeping, unless heavy rains are forecast.

Pontiac is still one of the main red-skinned varieties of potato. It matures earlier than some other good varieties and is a good all round potato in the kitchen. Desiree is another good, red-skin variety of potato. It has yellow waxy flesh and many grow some in their home gardens.

King Edward is the other red-skin potato that is a favourite of mine. It is also a waxy potato which produces excellent baked potatoes and is good for mashing and also making into chips. Otway Red is a great Australian-bred potato with a rich red skin and creamy flesh. It is good for roasting and also mashing.

Dutch cream and Nicola are two of my favourite white-skin, waxy potatoes. We had good results in growing both of these potatoes this year but may run out of supplies all too quickly. Dutch Cream has become well known for its rich, buttery taste. It makes a wonderful mash but will also provide great roasted or baked potatoes. Nicola looks very similar in shape with its long, oval frame. It is really good for baking and making potato gratin, as well as potato gnocchi.

There are many other exotic potatoes coming onto the Australian market nowadays. Pink Fir is a long, knobbly finger-shaped potato from England. Kipfler is a similar shaped potato from Germany with a buttery, nutty taste. They are fiddly to grow and the yields are low. However, if you are looking for a potato salad variety, then try either of these. Cook in their skin to make it easier for final peeling.

If you want to try some bright coloured potatoes, seek out either the Purple Congo or the Royal Blue. Both are excellent for mashing. Royal Blue actually has yellow flesh but the Purple Congo will give you the colours you desire.

I am a big supporter of local growers and especially those growing under organic, sustainable systems. If you do not have your own potato supplies, then the Capital Region Farmers Market is an excellent option for local supplies. Tobias and Beatrice Koenig of Ingelara grow an excellent range of biodynamic potatoes in a fertile old river valley just north of Cooma. They will have good supplies of nearly all the potatoes I have mentioned, over the next five to six months at the Saturday morning market. The quality of their commercial growing is top rate.

Apple, Onion and Potato Gratin

3 medium Golden Delicious apples

juice of 1 lemon

1 tbsp brown sugar

pinch of cinnamon

500g onion

600g Dutch Cream potatoes

½ tsp cayenne pepper

pinch of salt

4 tbsp fresh cream

4 tbsp butter

½ cup grated cheese

1 cup breadcrumbs

Preheat oven to 200C. Grease medium-sized casserole dish.

Peel, core and cut apples into thick slices. Combine the lemon juice, brown sugar and cinnamon and mix well with the sliced apple. Peel and finely slice the onions and potatoes and mix these two together. Layer the two sets of ingredients in the casserole dish, adding some cayenne pepper and salt to the layers of onion/potato. Fill to the top of the dish and ensure that the last layer is made up of apple slices. Pour the cream over the filling and dot butter on top.

Bake for about 45 minutes. Sprinkle grated cheese and breadcrumbs on top and add more dollops of butter. Bake for a further 15 minutes.

Serve with accompanying fresh vegetables from the garden.

This Week in the Garden

Plant out a row of Asian greens, loose leaf lettuces and rocket to keep your home salad supplies up over autumn. There is also still time to plant out well established seedlings of broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower for the winter crops.

Keep water supplies up to the thirsty leafy greens, sweet corn and big leaf vegetables, such as pumpkins and zucchinis.

Summer garden beds that are now finished should be cleaned up and made ready for planting winter crops, such as peas and broad beans.

While the days are still warm and dry, look to improving garden drainage where needed by digging a trench and backfilling with builders rubble or placing a length of agricultural pipe with drainage holes.

Owen Pidgeon runs the Loriendale Organic Orchard near Hall.