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I've tried oca every which way; I like the taste, but can't get a crop!
Potatoes are also edible and tasty raw. In fact I prefer them raw to boiled or steamed, (that includes the abomination that is a potato "baked" in foil - it's not baked! it's boiled in it's own watery juice ).I don't know why raw is such a minority taste - I think it's just the thought of the bitterness (and poison) in green ones that has put off the majority who've never tried.If you dutifully destroy all the tubers too small to cook, you are missing the treat of just rubbing them clean and popping them into your mouth - a delicious snack - often when you need one most.
Don't forget that oca are edible raw, where the lemony taste comes through better, so they can bulk out salads, slaws and even fruit salads (though yacon is better for the latter, because that sweet smoky taste is almost unique).I always get a small oca crop in late Sep/early Oct, but if I leave them in to get a good crop they get so many holes they are useless. Fortunately that doesn't happen when I grow them at home. I think the difference is that I've never grown potatoes at home, and I'm pretty sure the previous owner didn't grow anything edible.I've tried burying the whole oca plant when hard frosts arrive before they have bulked up, and they did bulk up better than the plants that were cut down by frosts - but they still got attacked. If I didn't have a safe soil to grow them I'd try digging the whole plant up, then rinse it and clamp it in clean soil/spent compost.
I wonder if we employed the "growing potatoes in big buckets" method for oca they could be better protected from slugs and also potentially protected from frosts while they bulk up using straw. I'm kind of converted to growing my spuds this way next year after a pretty successful trial.
Quote from: Vinlander on December 17, 2017, 11:58:32I don't know why raw potato is such a minority taste - I think it's just the thought of the bitterness (and poison) in green ones that has put off the majority who've never tried.No matter how rationally I try to think about this new information, my brain cannot process it without coming up with the response "that's just plain weird!"
I don't know why raw potato is such a minority taste - I think it's just the thought of the bitterness (and poison) in green ones that has put off the majority who've never tried.