Piccolo, the potato

A face?

A face?

 

 

It is too easy to think that Matisse and Picasso paintings, among others, as discovered in Munich, are the only thing that matters in the art world. And it is great fun to consider who these paintings had belonged to, and query the claims of ownership made by some. I have written elsewhere about the Jew who stitched diamonds into the seams of his clothes and used them to pay for his escape from the Nazis. He was pleased to tell me that when he arrived in the safe haven of . . . no-one wanted buy his diamonds for the price he was asking, so he was effectively  penniless and unable to start the good life he had dreamt of. He told me about individuals who had paid for the right to escape with paintings and antiques, he also knew of others, Christians, who, during the 1930's pawned paintings, due to the high inflation that raged through Germany at the time.

 

This variety potato did not exist during the war, but would have been welcome in the Warsaw ghetto for example, however deformed they appear. They are the variety Piccolo Star, a second early, that was introduced in 2010, though Alan Wilson writes that it was 2008.They are best used as salad and boiling potatoes.  Their parentage is Ausonia x VE74120,  (they have Wilja in them) and they are resistant to Blackleg.

 

We grew them in good loam, believing the marketing data that they were of high yield and even size.

We have found that the yield is high but the size is anything but even. Perhaps we would have had more evenness in size had we grown them in Holland where they were originally raised. Even Mr Wilson writes that they have a consistent round shape.

 

Second earlie's harvested in November and they look fun!

 

Picasso was an artist and is now a potato, so next year we may try them. They were developed in Holland as an early main-crop in 1992. Perhaps in the future someone will develop a Henri Matisse, or  van Gogh variety to accompany the Rembrandt that we may try next season.

Maxine potatoes . . .

 

There is, fortunately, something other than fine art . Here is a variety of potato called Maxine that are an early main crop. Differential watering and little rain has influenced their size. These potatoes were excellent boiled un-peeled with unsalted butter. Will we grow them again? Probably not, and this is because there are so many other varieties one can try.

The Maxine potato was developed in Scotland in 1994. It is a high yielding potato and usually large. They have a good drought and scab resistance. It is meant to have some resistance to blight, and we certainly found this to be the case. Commercial acreage is small.

This has been a good year for the potatoes we have grown, though with little rain and an erratic watering regime, it could have been better.  We have had great success with peas, broad beans, onions, and courgettes. This has been the worst year ever  for our  raspberries, yet one of the best for Victoria plums. In the green house the different varieties of tomatoes have been bountiful, as were the aubergines, and chillies. The green peppers (capsicum) have not been such a success. We have, however, been inundated with cucumbers, indeed the best year we have ever had. We have also  had great success with garlic and have just planted bulbs for next year.

In the greenhouse we  have an orange tree that has not produced flowers. The avocado has produced numerous new leaves. We also have an olive tree that produced a good covering of flowers early in the year. and now, the tree is covered with swelling olives.

The surplus fruit and vegetables have been bottled and frozen. Even some of the tomatoes have been bottled so that they can be used in Italian sauces.