First potatoes of the year!

I finished work slightly early today so I nipped to the plot for a spot of weeding and tidying. I also thought it was an opportune moment to see how the potato crop was progressing. It's 11 weeks since they were planted, and the conventional wisdom is that the first earlies should be ready for lifting from 12 weeks onwards. At my plot the Charlottes, second earlies, have been in flower for a week or so now, with the Pentland Javelin showing no signs of flowers just yet. As flowering is also viewed as a sign that potatoes are nearing readiness, I thought I'd stick the fork into the row of Charlottes and see what I found. Up came a dozen or so small to medium sized potatoes, followed by a similar amount from the next plant. Small, and perfectly formed, they were fantastic lightly steamed with flat leaf parsley and melted butter for tea!

Judging by what came out of the ground the crop still has a week or two to go before there are a large number of decent sized spuds, but this first rummage is always the most exciting of the year. I'm also aiming to take 'little and often' this year, as opposed to lifting them all at the same time and wondering what an earth to do with kilos of potatoes, so I'm happy to sacrifice a couple of plants in the name of early gratification for my stomach!!!