Tag: A Country Girls Heart -Beats that Matter

My Mom, seen my sprouting sweet potatoes on the counter and exclaimed, “You know you can grow sweet potatoes from these”?  She had given them to me, purchased locally to her house.  I had not eaten them all. Intrigued, I ask her for more details. This is how I began growing my own sweet potatoes.

She clued me in to the procedure. Showing me how to twist off the sprout at its base, she said, “If you stick them in water they will grow roots like crazy and make sure you keep adding water”.  Excited to see this process for myself I set up two glass jars.  I since learned there is also another way to start sweet potatoes. One can place a cut section of a the potato in water and it will grow both roots and a vines.  This too would be planted in soil to grow sweet potatoes.

I set them near a window to allow them access to sunshine.  Over a period of several weeks I did indeed have a sweet potato plant ready to place in soil.

I started some in smaller pots of dirt before moving to a permanent growing pot.   Unless the weather has not warmed enough to safely leave the plants outside, I would recommend planting directly into the container or ground where you will be growing the Sweet Potatoes.

I learned through a FB group that sweet potatoes could be grown in buckets.  One of my goals, as I began exploring how I was going to live a homestead lifestyle, was to use what I have.  Remembering I had saved cracked water buckets, I happily located them. Some had cracked from water freezing in them and others had not survived the pawing of a horse.  They were going to be perfect for allowing the soil to drain.

For soil, I went to what was left of a horse manure pile from several years past.  Bits and pieces of decomposing shavings left among the decomposed manure created a small amount of aeration.   How cool!  What was once horse manure was now a nutrient rich soil available for me to grow food in.  Ah Ha!  The horses do have a part in this homestead.  They are producing potting soil.

Once planted, regular watering(if there is not adequate rainfall) and keeping the weeds picked out are the only needed work til harvest.  These plants grow a rather large leaf base so after they are big enough the weeds are less of a concern.

My first year growing sweet potatoes I did not know what to expect at harvest.  When the weather was forecast to be below freezing in a few nights I knew the growing season was coming to an end for the potted plants. The beauty of raising potatoes in pots is dumping them to harvest the potatoes.  No digging!

I remember looking at the top of the bucket, seeing some potatos and hoping they were big enough.

I also recall turning the bucket over.  Much to my delight I found my worry had disappeared for all I could see through the crack across the bottom of the bucket was one large sweet potato!

I was impressed with the size of the sweet potatoes.

One of the best parts of this process was that I had produced food with out spending any money.  While not everyone can initially start for free, there are ways to start with only a small investment.  Anyone can raise sweet potatoes even if living in an urban environment.  Every year save some potatoes for sprouting for the next year.  This is one way to produce food, with the health benefits of eating local food, for minimal to no cost.

I cook them wrapped in tin foil, baked in the oven until soft(about an hour) and topped with salt and real butter…um, YUM! Of course there are many recipes for sweet potatoes, but this option meets the requirements for my current health challenges. What are your favorite sweet potato recipes?

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