Purple potatoes with purple flesh appeared on the territory of Russia relatively recently (after 2007), but managed to win the love of fans of exoticism. And this is not surprising, since you can cook familiar dishes from it, but with a certain twist - purple.
General characteristics of purple potatoes
Purple potatoes are wild plants native to South America. For a long time in European countries it was not used until modern scientists decided to select wild animals with different modern hybrids and varieties. The result is unusual tubers with a lot of useful properties.
This root vegetable is a perennial vegetable from the nightshade family. It differs in that the color of the inner pulp is slightly lighter than the peel.
Appearance
The outer side of the potato, like the pulp, has an exotic hue - purple. However, you can find varieties with lilac, light pink and pale purple. Distinctive features:
- oblong shape;
- pulp of medium starchy structure;
- thick rind;
- maximum length - 10 cm (depending on the variety);
- the pulp can be completely colored or partially;
- in a boiled form - crumbly;
- weight - 50-200 grams.
Taste characteristics
Purple types of potatoes have a special zest - a delicate flavor of a nut, which gives the cooked dishes a peculiar piquancy. But this potato is not suitable for frying. It is mainly used for making purees.
Varieties of purple potatoes
There are many varieties of purple potatoes that have been bred by both foreign and domestic breeders:
- Violett (Amethyst, Negro, French or Chinese truffle) is characterized by a large tuber weight, intense color of the core. Shelf life is long, the skin color is the darkest among all varieties. Belongs to a late look, it is universal in cooking.
- All blue ("All blue"). Color - lilac-blue, ripening - medium late, weight reaches 200 grams. Not stored for long.
- Red wander - average weight, ripens on the 75th day. A distinctive feature is red streaks, depressed eyes.
- Explosion. Belongs to an early variety, weight - no more than 120 grams. The shade is lilac, but with blue spots. Not stored for a long time.
- Lilac - the flesh is marbling (blue-white tint). Weight - medium, variety - early-medium, round-oval shape. Feature - sweetness of almond aftertaste.
- Gourmet has a weight of 100 grams, color - white and purple.
- Salblou. The mass of the tuber is 100 grams. Feature - you can cook salads without cooking.
- Surprise. The pulp has a pink tint, weight - up to 150 grams.
- Miracle contains a shock amount of vitamin C, is characterized by medium ripeness and low yield.
- Purple Cream and Northern Lights. The pulp has white streaks.
- Nacre has a shiny skin.
- Night. The pulp is exceptionally dark, without any inclusions.
Each variety has common characteristic features, but their main distinguishing feature from ordinary potatoes is that vitamins and nutrients are most concentrated in the peel, so potatoes are recommended to be cooked in “uniforms”.
Features of planting, growing and care
With proper care and compliance with the rules of agricultural technology, you can achieve increased yields. Therefore, you must strictly adhere to the prescribed standards.
Place of landing, soil preparation:
- Purple potatoes should grow on the sunny side, most often in the southwestern areas.
- The plant loves a lot of oxygen, so the soil is very carefully dug up and loosened before planting. The soil should be fluffy and light.
- The best soil is loamy, floodplain, neutral, sod-podzolic.
Purple varieties are planted at the same time as regular potatoes - April, May.
Preparation of planting material:
- If you are going to plant seeds, they must initially be soaked in the traditional way, given time to germinate. At home, germinated seeds are planted in pots, after which seedlings appear.
- When using tubers, they should be germinated within a month. The air temperature should not be less than 14 and more than 18 degrees. There should be enough sunlight on the roots.
Hilling and loosening:
- The first digging of the soil is carried out before the onset of frost. This is necessary so that pathogens die during the cold weather.
- Loosening and hilling is carried out regularly, after the first shoots have appeared.
- If a dry crust has formed on the ground, be sure to loosen and spud the soil.
Additionally, read the article: how to make a hiller out of a bicycle.
Watering:
- The first watering is carried out after germination.
- The second time the plant is poured after setting buds.
- The third is when the flowers fall.
If there is no rain, it is advisable to carry out light irrigation weekly. But at the same time, it is unnecessary to fill in with water, since purple potatoes do not tolerate moisture. This leads to putrefactive morbidity. But overdried soil should not be allowed either.
Fertilizer:
- The first fertilization is carried out at the preparatory stages before planting. Humus is used in an amount of 60-75 kg per 1 hundred square meters of land. Additionally, mineral fertilizer of 3 kg of superphosphate and one and a half kg of potassium salt (per 1 hundredth) is added.
- During planting, a handful of wood ash is poured directly into the hole, 1 tsp. nitroammophoska or nitrophoska.
Disembarkation rules:
- depth - 9-11 cm;
- the distance between the holes is 29-31 cm;
- the distance between the rows is 59-61 cm.
Pest and Disease Control
The advantage of purple varieties is immunity to diseases such as scab, rot, cancer (subject to agrotechnical rules). Average resistance is noted to Colorado and other beetles, late blight. Therefore, it is necessary to treat the plants with appropriate preparations.
For preventive purposes, it is advisable to treat the seedlings or tubers with a manganese solution prepared according to a standard recipe before planting in the ground. To prevent pests from attacking, periodically change the planting site, alternating potatoes with beans, phacelia, and cabbage.
How to store purple potatoes?
Purple potatoes love coolness, dryness, and darkness. Only under such conditions root crops are not exposed to morbidity.
Be sure to check each tuber before storing, selecting the damaged ones. Sort the potatoes periodically to remove any spoiled potatoes.
Pros and cons of purple potatoes
Benefits:
- piquancy of taste;
- good yield;
- unusual shade (you can surprise guests);
- resistance to major diseases;
- saturation with useful substances.
Disadvantages:
- there are a number of contraindications;
- thick rind;
- the need for fertilization;
- rotting in the rain.
Cooking use
The purple variety in ancient times was considered an original, gourmet potato, which was sold at fabulous prices. It made unusual dishes with a spicy flavor of nuts.
Today, the vegetable is available to everyone, so the hostesses and restaurant owners actively use it in cooking. It is fried, boiled, baked. It makes excellent potato pancakes, fries, zrazy, potato pancakes, chips, salads, mashed potatoes, baked dishes (especially puff ones), soups and much more. Dumplings with purple filling look especially unusual.
But a special feature is its use in dietary nutrition, as it promotes weight loss, saturates the body with microelements, and accelerates metabolism.
Cooking features:
- It is advisable to boil this vegetable in salted water. This will keep all the nutrients in it.
- After boiling in the "uniform", the peel is removed more easily than from conventional varieties.
- The best combination is considered with beans, meat, vegetables, fish and herbs.
- In order for the potatoes to boil faster, add 1 tbsp. butter, and after boiling (like beets), place a saucepan under cold water, adding ice cubes.
- It is forbidden to use a blender, as the mass is converted into a paste.
- During cooking, natural coloring substances are released from peeled potatoes, so the water acquires an emerald green hue. Do not let this scare you, on the contrary, you can boil soup from broth, make sauce.
- Due to the coloration of the water, the purple variety cannot be cooked with white potatoes and other vegetables.
- Prepares quickly, which must be taken into account.
Recipes for some dishes:
- Salad. Grate boiled potatoes, add greens and garlic, salt, pepper, season with mayonnaise. Looks great as a spread on a sandwich.
- Bake whole tubers, peel, cut in half. Place on a plate, sprinkle with Greek yogurt. Sprinkle greens on top.
- Crisps. Peel raw tubers, slice slices. Dry with paper towels. Make punctures with a fork. Sprinkle with salt. Place the chips in a metal sieve, dip in boiling vegetable oil. Place on a towel until fat drips.
- Boil standard noodles soup with purple potatoes (broth will be greenish). At the end of cooking, add grated processed cheese and herbs.
- Casserole. Boil the tubers, crush. Add a raw egg and a little warm cream. Put the fried mushrooms, onions and carrots on the bottom of the pan, purple puree on top. Then repeat 2-3 more of these layers. Place herbs and cheese on top.
Possible contraindications and indications
There are practically no contraindications for violet potatoes, but it is necessary to limit its consumption in such cases:
- low blood pressure (hypotension);
- individual intolerance;
- constipation;
- reduced acidity of the gastric juice;
- last stage obesity.
It is necessary to eat such a vegetable with the following pathologies:
- hypertension (high blood pressure);
- diabetes;
- weakened immunity;
- intoxication;
- some diseases of the heart and circulatory system;
- inflammatory processes in the body.
The benefits and harms of eating
Useful properties of purple potatoes:
- Lowering blood pressure.
- Inhibition of aging processes (due to shock quantity of antioxidants).
- Strengthening the immune system, which, in turn, prevents the development of colds, infectious and other diseases.
- Water balance normalization.
- Improving the functionality of the endocrine system.
- Aggravation of vision.
- Strengthening the walls of the circulatory system.
- Decrease in blood sugar levels.
- Elimination of flatulence, acceleration of the digestion process.
- Decrease in acidity with gastritis.
- Reducing inflammation in the internal organs.
- Maintaining the work of the myocardium.
- Irritability is eliminated.
- Sleep is normalized.
What harm can be:
- If you eat potatoes with contraindications, the diseases are aggravated: with hypotension, a hypotonic crisis occurs, etc.
- Potato abuse (overeating): flatulence, heaviness in the stomach, constipation, bloating.
- In case of individual intolerance: an allergic reaction occurs.
Reviews
Valery, 48 years old. 6-7 years ago I was in Europe, and there, visiting relatives, I was treated to purple potatoes. Honestly, I was surprised not only by the color, but also by the taste. In general, I bought seeds there and started growing at home. At first the harvest was very small, but then I began to plant tubers and it went. Now the wife surprises all household members and guests with unusual dishes. By the way, today, as it turned out, you can buy seeds in Russia. I have already tried 4 varieties - violet, explosion, salbla and mother of pearl. I can say that each is not bad in its own way.
Natalia, 54 years old. My neighbor has been growing violet for 3 years already, I also tried it. I followed all agrotechnical rules and, indeed, the yield is not bad. Only now we cannot understand what kind of variety it is, but delicious, with an almond flavor. Maybe someone will tell you?
Maryana, 22 years old. My parents grow Violet violet, so in the winter I am provided with this potato. I cook zrazy, bake, cook. Yes, anything can be done if it were fantasy and desire. But what I especially like is that my child, who a priori does not like potatoes, eats purple.
Sergey, 49 years old. Relatives sent me purple potatoes from the Krasnodar Territory. I don't know the name of the variety, but I want to tell you about it. There were few potatoes, so he planted it, cutting it into 1-2 eyes. Yes, germinated for about 3 weeks. He landed in the ground, poured ash into the hole. The rest of the time I fed a little with minerals. What particularly surprised was that it was not necessary to fill with water, there were fewer problems.
The variety is easy to distinguish from the rest - it has dark spots on its tops. When I was digging, I was upset, the tubers were not visible in the ground, I had to call my daughter for help. The harvest is good, and the tubers are very large. I did not expect such a result with only eyes. The only difficulty is to attack Colorado. This potato bug like more than other varieties. So he collected it almost every day, often poisoned it.
Irina, 37 years old. I bought Violett at the exhibition. A little expensive, but I wanted something exotic. I planted it in the ground, after about 20 days, shoots appeared. The bushes were small, I thought there would be no harvest, but when I gathered, I was surprised. I counted so, it turned out to be about 140-160 kg per hundred square meters. Not very much, but considering that I threw in one eye at a time, it turned out well. I liked the fact that the tubers were large, small only 1-2 pieces per bush. Immediately postponed for the next landing. I store it in the cellar with ventilation, because, as it is written, the variety does not like moisture.
Hide
Add your review
Purple potatoes contain many nutrients, have a unique color, piquant taste, and are used for diabetes and certain diseases. Not very whimsical in growing and caring, but has its own contraindications. If you decide to plant it in your garden and eat it, be sure to consider all the above facts.
Posted by
2
Russia. City: Zheleznogorsk
Publications: 56 Comments: 0