New Potatoes balls of flour

New Potatoes

There is something very special about new potatoes in Ireland. They just jog up some great memories from my youth for me.

Every year when Christmas was over there were two very prominent topics in our house, the vegetable seed selection and the new potatoes.

My father always sent away for Suttons garden  catalogue to see what was new on the vegetable seed side and when the first seed potatoes would be available. When he saw the earliest date, he could get them he was on operation seed potato.

The sprouting boxes were taken down and the dark corner of the shed was allocated in readiness for the arrival of his beloved Home Guard and British Queens. He spoke about them with a rare passion, about their soft skin and being so tasty to eat. They were balls of flour. He described eating them with large amounts of butter sprinkled with salt. I think he salivated every time he spoke about them.

In late January there was a heightened sense of anticipation when word was out that the newly certified seed potatoes had arrived in Ireland. I think some came from Donegal while others came from Holland.

Anyway, when these little potato seed babies were procured, they were placed safely in their sprouting boxes with all due care and diligence with the date they were placed in sprouting confinement clearly written. He also placed the date in his diary with the anticipated planting out date also pencilled in.

And so, once the baby potatoes were in safe sprouting mode the process of selecting which onion sett and lettuce would he plant started.  He went through the catalogue and then made the momentous decision to stick with The All the Year-Round brand for another year. Sure, we all knew he would, but he had to go through the process.

Likewise with the White Lisbon onions and so the system continued for a couple of weeks selecting leeks, broad beans, peas, beetroot, corn on the cob, cucumber, radishes, cabbage, Brussel sprouts, cauliflower and many more.

While this research was ongoing our little potatoes were beginning to open a few eyes, and it would not be long before they were placed outside in mother earth.

Now there were two long drills readied with well-rotted seaweed for fertiliser and so by the beginning of March operation potato seed planting began with me, the junior operative, placing the seed in the hole prepared by my father and then they were all covered over and left to mother earth and nature to grow and mature.

He was always hopeful that he would be eating his balls of flour by the end of May and very often he was not disappointed.

 As the potato stalks grew, he earthed them up and depending on the heat of the weather the flowers appeared which signified that the potato crop was proceeding nicely but we would have to be patient. I remember digging a stalk from the middle of a drill to see how they were progressing, and I must admit my father was none too pleased.

He reminded us of the disastrous potato famine of 1845 -1847 when so many people who were dependent on the potato for their staple diet, died from starvation. I remember a line from my schooldays ‘Prátaí ar maidin, prátaí ag am loin, is dá néireoin ag meán oíche is prátaí a gheobhainn’.

There was mass emigration from Ireland when millions took the famine ships to America to eke out a living after the failure of the potato crop.

I loved that special moment when the first stalk of new potatoes was dug out of the ground. I loved rubbing them in my hands to rub away any dirt and then give them a run under the cold tap before handing them over to my mother to boil. She put them in the big saucepan on the range with a few leaves of mint added to the water for flavour,

Well, you never saw a pot watched as eagerly until my mother made the formal announcement that the potatoes were boiled and ready for eating.

And so, having drained off the water, the heaped-up saucepan was unloaded onto the big platter in the middle of the table. The pound of Lee Strand Creamery Butter was opened. The salt cellar was in position, and the new spud feast started. There was no meat or veg added to the first feast of new potatoes. My mother and sister nibbled a few and liked them. My father and myself must have eaten ten each, liberally laced with butter and a good sprinkling of salt. We were stuffed full as bulls and happy that we had launched another potato year.

Next came vegetable seed planting.