Grow super-early potatoes by starting a few tubers in a potato sack about now under cover for a tasty treat ready weeks earlier than those you’ll be planting outside in March.
Grab a Pack of Seed Potatoes
You’ll need a couple of potato sacks, multipurpose compost and potato fertiliser from our garden centre here in Newcastle upon Tyne, plus a pack of our super-early seed potatoes: varieties like ‘Rocket’ and ‘Swift’ are known for being really quick to reach harvesting size.
Make a 15cm layer of compost at the bottom of your potato sacks, then place two or three tubers on top. Cover with another 30cm of compost, water, and leave in a frost-free greenhouse or conservatory to start sprouting.
Grow Your Own
After a few weeks, you’ll start to see the sprouts erupting from the compost. Keep them well watered, and as they grow, tip in more compost, mixed with a handful of potato fertiliser, burying all but the topmost leaves. Repeat until you’ve completely filled the potato sack – this will give you the maximum yield of plump, sweetly-flavoured tubers. Once the plant reaches full size, start to feel around gently in the compost with your fingers – once you find tubers about the size of a hen’s egg, tip the whole lot out and enjoy your scrummy early harvest.