Topic: Oca

[ACE]

I have just seen a picture of a huge crop of oca that was dug up this week near me. I expect there is a thread somewhere, but I will ask anyway. Who has grown this? what does it taste like? and what time of year did you plant them.  Ok no need to answer, found the answers on another thread. If a mod could delete this post, go ahead.

[sparrow]

If you want some tubers to try, send me a PM with your address and I will post some over. Am just digging mine up now. Late planting (ie July) has no real impact on harvest, so mine go in after early spuds.

[Silverleaf]

If you want some tubers to try, send me a PM with your address and I will post some over. Am just digging mine up now. Late planting (ie July) has no real impact on harvest, so mine go in after early spuds.

I did a similar thing last year, starting the plants off in little pots and then putting them in the beds as space became available from harvesting potatoes. So some were planted as early as June, some as late as early September. I can't see that there's much difference in the resulting harvests.

We like them parboiled and then roasted. :)

[ACE]

If you want some tubers to try, send me a PM with your address and I will post some over.

Thanks for the offer but I am getting some locally

[sparrow]

Great! :)

[GREGME]

After roasting they taste like potatoes with lemon sauce but have a slightly gelatinous texture which not everyone likes.
If you grow a combination of red and yellow ones can they look pretty on a plate though they do discolour. Need a good clean like pink fir apple.
I'm out of love with them though as their season is too long and the tubers dont bulk up much until December or later. Yield small compared to potatoes in my experience but definitely worth growing.

[Vinlander]

Next year I'm going to dig the plants up - whole - as soon as they stop growing sideways - and clamp them. Hopefully they will be big enough to try this in September.

I found in 2014 that if you gather the entire plants and bury them, the haulms continue to drive growth in the tubers even without sunlight. Unfortunately that time the pests found them even though I clamped them in a new bed (the pests that spend Sept/Oct drilling 1mm holes in them).

This time I will lay them out and give them a bit of a clean with the hose before clamping the whole lot in something fresh - fresh compost from the bin or 'freshly' rotted woodchip from my spade-deep woodchip paths. I might use a builders bag for further isolation from the soil pests.

It would be a shame to have to grow them in pots, and my builderbag beds are too precious for anything except carrots and tuberous peas...

Cheers.