Sally's GF3 thread

[Sally PB]

Now I get a better understanding why these will grow better in light soil,,, rather than in heavy.

The first time I tried to grow them, they were in my heavy soil garden. I thought since it was up on the hill and got more hours of daylight, they'd do better. Nope. I got nada.

 

[cavemanrich]

They're now in the green house. That's water on the (dirt) floor to raise the humidity. Temp is about 90 -- good -- but the humidity was only 50. I hope dumping a couple gallons of water on the floor every day will do the trick.

I do not have any knowledge, and never knew that sweet potatoes need to be cured. I do get brainstorms occasionally. What if you lightly sprayed the sweet potatoes with a misting bottle??? I mean,,, not drown them,, but lite spray..
How long does the curing process take?? How would the sweet potatoes be if you decided to peel, and cook one right now??

Until recently,,,, I would always pass on them at Thanksgiving dinner. Then recently, DD#3 came up with a dyno recipe,,, that is tasty. It is on the sweet side with brown sugar? I think.
If interested,, I can ask her for that recipe. ,, We of course just purchase them from grocery store.. That means I have no idea, of the variety,,,, but the most common I assume.
Have never made, but have purchased SWEET POTATO PIE. I seen it as parallel to PUMPKIN PIE,
Most of my pumpkin pies come from grocery stores. I have a weakness passing them as they are displayed.

 

[fuzzi]

I do not have any knowledge, and never knew that sweet potatoes need to be cured. I do get brainstorms occasionally. What if you lightly sprayed the sweet potatoes with a misting bottle??? I mean,,, not drown them,, but lite spray..
How long does the curing process take?? How would the sweet potatoes be if you decided to peel, and cook one right now??

Until recently,,,, I would always pass on them at Thanksgiving dinner. Then recently, DD#3 came up with a dyno recipe,,, that is tasty. It is on the sweet side with brown sugar? I think.
If interested,, I can ask her for that recipe. ,, We of course just purchase them from grocery store.. That means I have no idea, of the variety,,,, but the most common I assume.
Have never made, but have purchased SWEET POTATO PIE. I seen it as parallel to PUMPKIN PIE,
Most of my pumpkin pies come from grocery stores. I have a weakness passing them as they are displayed.

I tried eating a sweet potato before curing. Blech, like eating balsa wood.

 

[Sally PB]

Yeah, my understanding is that sweet potatoes need to be cured to do two things: Toughen the skin, and make the starches turn to sugars. For that they need two things: Warmth, (80+ degrees F), and high humidity (85-90% RH).

Right now, they are sitting in the green house, still as dirty as when I dug them. I tried to brush off the dirt, and kept rubbing off the skin as I did so. I thought I'd give them a day for the dirt to dry a bit, and then try to clean them up again. I'm going to reread that download and see how it addresses the dirt issue.

The info I read was adamant: Do not use water to clean them before they're cured. I'm going to assume that means don't mist them either. That's exactly what I was thinking to do, @cavemanrich, because, well, it makes sense doesn't it?

I'm just feeling my way along here. I posted this in the garden thread too, so maybe someone who has done this before will give some input.

@fuzzi, The balsa wood comment made me laugh.

 

[NanaK]

I have never grown sweet potatoes only regular white potatoes. Sweet potatoes are commercially grown all around me. If you have a farmer connection, they will let you gleen their fields after they harvest. Ton's of taters are left in the field! It's very common to ride though the area and see people walking across the fields with buckets. You can usually fill a 5 gallon bucket in a few minutes! They are laying on top of the ground. No digging!

Recently I lost my farmer connection so I have considered grown a few in the near future.

My FIL often had sweet potatoes in his garden. To cure them he would spread them out under a shelter out of the rain. After about a week he would turn them over. He didn't really brush off much of the dirt until they had dried some. The skin toughens some but the dirt is dry and easier to brush off. Once they seemed dry he'd spread them out in a couple of shallow pans/boxes in a single layer and put them in a cool dark place. If one starts to mold/rot remove it because the rot will spread quickly. Any that are damaged use them first. Do not let them freeze.

I did this to the one's we picked up from the fields too.

 

[Sally PB]

Thank you! If we get any sun, the warm temps will be there. If we don't, then the green house will slowly cool off.

As I said, it doesn't take much sunshine to heat that space. Even 15 minutes will make a difference. It's... wait for it... The Green House Effect!

I'm retired. I already quit my day job.

 

[NanaK]

I'm retired. I already quit my day job.

Me too!

I'll be glad when hubby retires. He's a couple years younger than me. He says why should he retire? Has an easy job that he loves. Says he's got it made and doesn't want to work for me!

 

[Sally PB]

Hubby still works "when they need him" at his old job. The owner told him that he "could write his own ticket" with his retirement. If he decided that retirement wasn't agreeing with him, they would take him back in a heartbeat.

I think he'd like to be fully retired, but he really likes the people there, and the work. He's interested in working for barter. Time on their machines, getting some building materials. That would be fine by me. He said going into the tool room is like a kid going into a candy shop.

 

[Sally PB]

I am learning about sweet potatoes.

Yesterday, I visited them in the green house. ("Hi SPs! How ya doin'?") To begin with, I cleaned off the dirt. I thought the skin was thin and fragile. No, that's just the outer layer, and yes you can rub it off with your finger. Now that these have dried a bit, I can see that there's a 1/16" thick, heavy skin under the "color layer" (as I thought of it).

When I first dug them and saw a cross section, it was all the same orange color. Now I can see a demarcation line where the skin is, covering the flesh.

The green house was warm, thanks to some intermittent sunshine, but the humidity wasn't nearly high enough. I'm trying another set up. I have the potatoes laid out on the table and put clear plastic totes over them. A mini green house in the green house. I put a damp sock under each tote to try to boost the humidity.

The sky is clear and we will start with some sunshine, at least. I'll go check on them in a couple hours.

 

[Sally PB]

The forecast is for temps in the 30s the next two nights. I think I'd better pick my luffas. They're still dark green, so they may be a total bust. I have one that is 3-ish inches in diameter, and three more that came later and are smaller. They may not be big enough to have sponge-ated (made up word), but we'll see.