Pete Heckes gave Farmer Nyel some seed potatoes a few months back. They were a kind we had not planted (nor had we eaten) before, but Nyel had heard about them. Ozette potatoes. Nyel eagerly planted them in one of our raised garden beds and they have been growing like anything. The other day was deemed The Time of the Ozette Potato Harvest and Nyel dug them up.
Ozette potatoes, according the Slow Food website, are considered ‘fingerling’ potatoes. Ours range from 3 to 7 inches long (as the site said they would) and are about an inch and a half in diameter (as the site also said.) They come in both purple and white – though they were only shown online in white. And ours seemed to have grown in lumpy sections.
Pete told us that he got the potatoes from a friend up in Neah Bay where the Makah tribe has been growing them for more than 300 years. The Spanish explorers brought them from Peru back in the late seventeenth century. Apparently, they are also called “Anna Cheeka’s Ozette” and “Makah Ozette.”
According to the Slow Food folks, the potato has an earthy and nutty flavor that is similar to the taste sensed in cooked dry beans. The flesh is firm and the texture is very creamy. The Ozette is generally served steamed, fried, or roasted.
We tried our first two – the ones I cut open for this photograph – baked, and we found they tasted like… drum roll… potatoes! No earthy, nutty, flavor. (Don’t tell me there are Pretentious Potato People. I’ve barely gotten used to Wine Snobs!) And just what does ‘the taste sensed in dry beans’ mean, anyway?
We thought there was no appreciable difference in flavor between the purples and the whites, though the purples seemed a bit more mealy in texture. That is NOT to say, however, that “creamy” was the descriptor we would use for the whites. They tasted, as I’ve said, like potatoes. The fun part is the color and shape. If I were one of the PPPs writing for that Slow Food site, I’d talk about ‘presentation’… I think that’s the key with Ozette potatoes.
Nyel has already set aside quite a few for seed potatoes for next year’s crop. And I’m planning our meals around the color purple.
The fun part, of course, is eating food you raised yourself, although purple potatoes come in just a hair behind “I grew it myself!” in the fun department. I’ve been doing swiss chard, blueberries, and now some tomatoes straight out of my garden this summer, and I find it very satisfying. I’m sure you and Nyel feel the same every time you eat one of the girls’ eggs, Sydney.
Nyel, I think you and Sydney should plan a little day trip to Neah Bay, and bring a nice big pail or three with you. I think you need soil like the Indians use for your potatoes.
Don’s dad, Pop, believed his Illinois loamy soil was the secret to growing a tasty one. When he came to live with us we had a small vegetable garden. He was eager to grab a spade and turn over the soil when he learned we’d turn the thing over to him, and even enlarge it. As he lifted the first shovelful, he gasped, “What the hell?! This is sand!” We hauled in a load of topsoil for him, but he never believed his potatoes tasted like those from the soil from which he’d always raised tasty ones.
I must say, everything from his garden in IL was fabulous, the soil having been “made” by a huge glacier.
If you do get the old-fashioned soil, I’ll bet you’ll find they change in taste. Good luck!
Anne
Thanks for the thoughts Anne, but obviously I didn’t make clear that the potatoes are GREAT and are just as they should be. (It was the overblown remarks on Slow Food that I took umbrage with). As for our soil, I think it’s mighty good — well amended, you might say. Our vegetable garden is just where my grandfather’s was from 1902 until well into the 1940s or ’50s and I’m sure there was lots of natural fertilizer that went into it over the years — even when we were kids and the only horse left was Countess! My dad had his garden there, as well,and now it’s our turn. Nyel is good about “rotating crops” etc. to put nitrogen back into the soil. But I do know what Pops meant. At our house on the Bay where there had never been a garden, it was, indeed, pure sand! Obviously, what we needed was a horse!
Digging potatoes is so much fun! We grew some at our house in Oysterville and also here in Olympia. Like digging for gold. Enjoy your Ozette potatoes!