Just chitting!

Potatoes. Funny things. You spend a year trying to stop them from sprouting. Then February comes and it’s time to chit the new seed potatoes.

Chitting is the process of encouraging them to sprout. It’s simple enough. They need to be spread out on flat trays or boxes or in empty egg boxes. Then we put them in a light room but not in direct sunlight. The roots and shoots begin to appear over a few weeks prior to planting in April. 



I ordered four varieties about two weeks ago from an organic seed company in the south of Holland. 

Why four? Some people order based on harvest timing. So there are first early, second early and main crop. For example. The intention being to spread out the harvest. 

Me? Harvest timing? No! I order based on colour. 

This year as ever I have to have purple potatoes. 



These beauties are called Blue Congo. I haven’t tried them before but our usual purple potatoes are a little on the small size so I thought I’d try a different one. 

Their eyes (the part which sprouts) are blue-ish purple already!



We also like red skinned potatoes so we have two types of these. 



Red Emma and Monte Carlo. 



And finally some standard white potatoes. I think I went for a disease resistant variety called Nicola.