Author Topic: Oca - New Zealand Yams  (Read 2330 times)

Tiny Clanger

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Oca - New Zealand Yams
« on: February 23, 2019, 16:47:19 »
A chum has given half a dozen of these things that look rather like Pink Fir Apple spud. No idea what to do so I've set them out to chit with the Arran Pilot.

T&M reckon they should be started in potsand planted out mid/late May post frosts. Really can't afford to lose them all as chummy who gave them is so excited. Really need to get some result here.  Anyone grown these successfully? Tips would be most welcome.   :blob7:
I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Obelixx

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #1 on: February 23, 2019, 17:42:03 »
It's actually an Andean crop and needs a long season, cropping in late autumn.   They grow quite a lot of it in Washington State, USA, apparently but it's too hot/cold/dry in other parts.  https://www.cultivariable.com/instructions/andean-roots-tubers/how-to-grow-oca/

I read about it a couple of years ago and fancied having a go but found neither tubers nor info for my Belgian garden and won't be trying it in this one as it's too hot and dry.
Obxx - Vendée France

Tiny Clanger

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #2 on: February 23, 2019, 20:34:54 »
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Thanks for that Obelixx. I will try starting some in pots planting out post frost and some direct post frost. I'll bung them in the area next to the celaruac when they go out. Fingers crossed x
« Last Edit: February 23, 2019, 20:37:10 by Tiny Clanger »
I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Tee Gee

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #3 on: February 23, 2019, 21:02:22 »
Personally I haven't a clue but I did a Google and found this;

https://m.wikihow.com/Grow-Yams

At least there are a few methods to choose from!

Best of luck keep us informed!

Vinlander

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #4 on: February 24, 2019, 00:20:14 »
There's lots of stuff on t'web to tell you how to grow oca, but one thing's for sure - they aren't yams, they aren't related to yams and they have their own way of growing. Their closest relative is Wood Sorrel.

They do crop late,  but unlike yams this isn't just because they need more heat and sunlight to mature than they get here.

Yams appreciate a polytunnel but oca doesn't need one - they grow perfectly well outside in the UK but their tubers are triggered by changing day length - that's the main reason the plants don't start making tubers until Sept/Oct.

You could do a lot worse than study http://www.realseeds.co.uk/unusualtubers.html

If you do get hard frosts before the end of Nov pick the big ones just a little earlier and bury the whole plant a bit deeper - a few weeks later there will be more tubers, and they carry on producing until all the stems are withered away.

Anyone who wants just any old tuber should just ask for some - I can't imagine anyone here having any trouble growing a surplus for gifts, after all there are small ones in every crop and they are fine as starts - they don't produce small tubers, just less tubers overall.

If you want to buy some then go for a variety with small eyes - all oca are very easy to clean with their shiny skins, but it can never be too easy, and it's even easier if they don't have crannies.

Whatever you get you'll never need to buy more - unless your soil is absolutely riddled with soil pests - in which case plant in used growbag medium in a lined trench - or get a friend to grow them somewhere else and do an end of year swap shop.

Unlike potatoes the raw ones are just as good - a nice lemony starchy snack.

Cheers.

There's no substitute for doing your own research, then you can ask specific questions.
With a microholding you always get too much or bugger-all. (I'm fed up calling it an allotment garden - it just encourages the tidy-police).

The simple/complex split is more & more important: Simple fertilisers Poor, complex ones Good. Simple (old) poisons predictable, others (new) the opposite.

ACE

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #5 on: February 24, 2019, 08:30:02 »
I grew them one year, waste of space. Acidy taste, small fiddly tubers and can be invasive like nearly all the other oxalis weeds. Just another 'designer' veg fancied by the brown bread and sandals brigade.

Tiny Clanger

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #6 on: February 24, 2019, 09:08:05 »
Thanks TeeGee, I have only had me plot a couple of seasons, and only just getting to grips with potatoes and onions (turnips are a total failure).  I will give it a go. Nothing venture nothing win eh. X
I expect to pass through this world but once; any good thing therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Vinlander

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #7 on: February 24, 2019, 11:02:15 »
I grew them one year, waste of space. Acidy taste, small fiddly tubers and can be invasive like nearly all the other oxalis weeds. Just another 'designer' veg fancied by the brown bread and sandals brigade.

I also love being provocative about gardening* but on matters of taste (and flavour) I take off my contrarian hat and stick with "each to their own".

*(the $100billion global cut flower industry's idea of selling "perfection" has created one of the world's worst abusers of soil/environment).

*(probably even worse than using good arable land for golf courses instead of the unusable marginal areas it was invented for).

If you'd said 'novelty' veg I would have agreed with you in general.

Until I grew up (ie. reached 50) and put aside childish things (especially all forms of 'disposable' culture), I spent a lot of money, time and effort trying a load of 'new' foods that were actually old "famine foods" and should have stayed that way.

Oca is different - whoever "designed" oca has probably been dead for at least 1000 years and it is still the number 2 root in most of the Andean areas - it's definitely not famine food, though it is immune to blight so would really come into its own if we ever had another potato famine.

I actually prefer oca to boiled potatoes and especially the kind of grey lumpy mash they used to call "food" when I went to school.

The taste is slightly sharp but it tastes like lemon to me. They say a bit of drying in the sun can make oca taste of apricots - but I will believe that when I taste it, and there's a lot of variation in flavour between varieties - a friend gave me some that were truly beautiful - like a lode of carnelians - but it had no taste at all.

I have never had any trouble getting rid of them for a rotation.

Cheers.     

PS. I actually prefer brown bread, and given the right weather I much prefer sandals - the loopiest fashion statement I've seen regularly is people wearing big boots to to see and be seen on a sunny beach in the med...
With a microholding you always get too much or bugger-all. (I'm fed up calling it an allotment garden - it just encourages the tidy-police).

The simple/complex split is more & more important: Simple fertilisers Poor, complex ones Good. Simple (old) poisons predictable, others (new) the opposite.

Obelixx

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #8 on: February 24, 2019, 12:09:03 »
Luckily for me, I prefer sweet potatoes to ordinary spuds and they turn out to be healthier and just as versatile.  I grow veggies for flavour and am happy to try new stuff but some are a once only - asparagus peas, Chinese artichokes, yellow beetroot come to mind - because the flavour or the yield or both are unsatisfactory.

I've always preferred brown bread and, as the stuff on offer in UK SMs and local bakers in the 80s was so awful, I took to making my own.   Offerings have improved since then and we've been in the lands of serious baking too so nowadays I only make wholemeal soda bread and naans and chapatis and rotis which I can't get here.
Obxx - Vendée France

Vinlander

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #9 on: February 27, 2019, 13:29:06 »
I find the flavour of yellow/gold beet irresistable in stews though the yield is only tolerable - ie. less than red beet (which we basically expect to give us a free lunch).

I also grow the pink stripy one - it's yield is almost normal but it only has half the flavour of the golden ones. It hardly bleeds at all - I want that earthy flavour but I don't want a stew that ends up looking like a bucket of blood.

I really rate chinese artichokes raw and cooked, but they are rampant so they need a lined trench.

Asparagus peas are a pet hate of mine - they are sold as a substitute for other flavours but they are actually a substitute for cardboard,  however I hate Apios even more.

Cheers.
With a microholding you always get too much or bugger-all. (I'm fed up calling it an allotment garden - it just encourages the tidy-police).

The simple/complex split is more & more important: Simple fertilisers Poor, complex ones Good. Simple (old) poisons predictable, others (new) the opposite.

Obelixx

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Re: Oca - New Zealand Yams
« Reply #10 on: February 27, 2019, 15:03:48 »
Most people use the stripey ones raw in salads where they are decorative and the flavour doesn't out compete other stuff.  Yellow beets I tried were too earthy for me.  I like the natural sweetness of red beets and their leaves are good in salads and stir fries too.
Obxx - Vendée France

 

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