We’ve had heavy rain in Brisbane over the past couple of days. So I packed the Super-Wellies into the car boot and set off for the allotment this morning.
As expected I sloshed through the farm to reach my bit of dirt (allotment!). But today it was more like my patch of mud.
The object of the exercise was a bit of bandicooting. For the uninitiated it entails grubbing round in the dirt (or mud in this case) to forage for the new potatoes. ‘Why bother?’ I hear you asking. BECAUSE there is nothing like a new potato boiled with a few sprigs of mint and slathered all over with as much butter as your doctor will allow, and when I woke up this morning that is what I fancied for dinner.
As it happened I ended up with only a ‘side order’ of potatoes but they are so young and tender and so gorgeous that I am happy as this is the first harvest of the season. I took them home, washed them, set them on a bed of mint (from the allotment of course) for the photograph.
‘Nicola’ potatoes and very ordinary mint from the allotment
I have to admit that the plate is a side plate.
The other spuds (please refer to the subject of this post) are sitting on the kitchen windowsill while I wait for them to chit.
‘King Edward’ seed potatoes.
So I’m looking forward to a crop of King Edward potatoes before Christmas.
Happy gardening.
Allotment Adventures with Jean 
Jul 13, 2012 @ 14:04:18
Nothing like new baby spuds and a little butter mmmmmm yummy! 🙂
Jul 13, 2012 @ 17:07:38
Couldn’t agree more Ruth. Thanks for calling by.
Jul 13, 2012 @ 17:03:25
I’m new to all this gardening lark, Vic my husband usually does it, but I’ve one question, how do I know when to pull up the spuds as we’ve got a whole garden full which have grown themselves from peelings buried in the garden.
Jul 13, 2012 @ 17:14:37
You can pull the potatoes when the tops (the green stalks) die off. They should be ready by then. If you are not sure you can always put your hand into the soil and feel around the roots of the plant to check if the spuds are big enough. That is what I did today and feel they could be left in a big longer. So I’ll try again in a week or so.
Jul 13, 2012 @ 21:06:50
Because we planted so many, we’ve been pulling a plant almost daily for dinner. We won’t run out. I love the tiny little potatoes – they’re like candy with butter, salt and pepper. Never tried them with mint, though. Good tip.
Jul 14, 2012 @ 06:04:12
When I was a girl in the UK and the Jersey ‘new potatoes’ came into the shops I remember my mother putting a sprig of mint into the water when she boiled them. They were a real treat and only lasted for a short season.
Jul 14, 2012 @ 06:33:03
Good morning
My name is Pat and I have a question that I hope you can help me with. This will be my first time planting potatoes. I bought a bag of certified spuds from the nursery and they told me to put them in the dark until the warmer weather. I live in Canberra and warm weather is a couple of months away. Could you please help me and let me know if I’m supposed to be doing something to them up until planting?
Jul 14, 2012 @ 08:13:35
Hello Pat. Thanks for visiting. I am not experienced with growing potatoes in Canberra which has such a different climate from my sub-tropical.
However, the Canberra Organic Growers Society have a fund of knowledge. The link is http://www.cogs.asn.au and I advise you to check out their Planting Calendars for both Winter and Spring, unless you have a really sheltered garden they recommend planting potatoes Sept/Oct/Nov in the spring. Their blog link is http://www.cogs.asn.au/blog/ and this will give you the opportunity to communicate with other gardeners in your area who would be able to give you local advice on if there is anything you could be doing for the seed potatoes up until planting. I do hope this helps. Best wishes, Jean.
Jul 16, 2012 @ 05:21:08
Thank you Jean. The two links are a great help. Happy gardening.
Jul 14, 2012 @ 11:52:12
We managed to source a big bag of King Edwards a month ago and they were HEAVENLY. Amazingly good for roasting, chipping (oven of course) and baking. Not so good for boiling (went to mush) but you can’t have everything and who cares about mash when you are dripping with goosefat from your heaven sent roasties? I adore new spuds and mum always grew spuds and bandicooted them. Our soil is full of rocks and spud planting straight into the ground isn’t an option but mum told us to build up our raised beds or to use an old chook feed sack and put about a foot and a half of good soil/compost into it and plant your spuds and roll down the top of the sack. As the plant grew…just add more soil and roll up the sack a bit until you get to the top of the sack and heaven on a potato stick. I guess this is along the lines of people planting spuds directly into bags of potting mix (like Jamie Oliver did on his show)…by the way…wouldn’t we ALL love Jamie Olivers amazing walled garden! AND for that matter is ANYONE out there fooled that he has anything to do with the day to day machinations of that garden? Nope…I didn’t think so 😉
Jul 15, 2012 @ 14:18:28
Yes to your idea of planting spuds in bags. I may have to plant some of mine in bags, and the rest in what ground I have left. And Yes again, I don’t suppose Mr Oliver does his own garden, but I love the program nevertheless.
Jul 15, 2012 @ 19:24:26
I would have bought the book to the series if it had those lovely little drawings in it but it didn’t…so I didn’t 😉
Jul 14, 2012 @ 14:24:32
We are getting a lot of rain here too just south of Brissy…unfortunately red mud everywhere again!! I love your little harvest, i never seem to have much luck with potatoes unfortunately but keep trying becuase we eat so many of them!!
Thanks for dropping by my blog recently too….lovely, lovely comment you left and it brightened my day…i have been enjoying exploring your blog and shall be back…..love your little cage for the cabbage…fantastic idea!x
Jul 15, 2012 @ 14:24:41
Hi again Jode, thanks for visiting. The rain in Brissy has stopped this afternoon and I’m off to the allotment to scatter chicken poo. I know, I live the high life.
I visited your blog again this afternoon and it’s really interesting what you are doing to bring out the creative side in your children. My youngest grandson is four years old and he gets a lot of pleasure from his craft work, at the moment he is into collage.
Jul 15, 2012 @ 17:13:41
Fantastic Jean. I’ll bet they tasted delicious!
Jul 15, 2012 @ 17:57:57
Brydie they were, I’ve been over to the allotment again this afternoon and found enough for dinner tonight.