Charlotte

I've been harvesting potatoes again. This time it was two more of my (4) pots of that classic Second Early "Charlotte". Along with many other people - especially GYOers - I think this is probably the best early potato ever.

This batch was the crop from two seed-tubers, each grown in one of my big 35-litre pots. The joint weight was 1.73kgs, not a big yield, but OK.

There were a few "tiddlers" that were not worth using, but the majority of the tubers were big, regularly-shaped and with nice smooth skins. Hardly any signs of Scab.

Once they're washed you can see what beauties some of those tubers are!

On Wednesday evening we ate some of the previous batch of Charlottes, cooked in our Actifry machine. This gadget keeps the food constantly turning at low speed whilst it cooks, and uses a lot less fat (vegetable oil in this case) than other methods. As well as the oil, we coated the potatoes with a generous sprinkling of Herbes de Provence and some of the powerful dried Oregano we brought back from Portugal. The end result is something quite different from chips or roast potatoes, but definitely very delicious.

Most often though, we like to eat potatoes like this plain boiled. This way you can enjoy the taste more.

I now have only four more pots of potatoes; two of Nicola and one each of Kestrel and Charlotte. As the pots become vacant, I fill them up with other things for a second crop. So far I have two with Leeks in, two with Dwarf French Beans, 2 with Radishes (just germinated), and now after harvesting this latest batch of Charlottes, two with Carrots (Amsterdam Forcing 3), just sown yesterday.

I have done quite a bit of re-arranging in the garden too. I have moved several of the big tomato plants into the space that formerly housed the potatoes, because they will get more sun there.

Plants with yellow foliage are last few potatoes. Others (green) are tomatoes.

All my tomato plants have set fruit now, even the big beefsteak varieties. If the blight stays away (big if), it could well turn out to be a very good year for tomatoes!