Jane Powers uncovers the finest spuds in a new book by a potato guru
'Are these any good for mashing?" a woman asked me in the supermarket the other day while holding up a 'Kerr's Pink' potato. "Well, yes," I said, after checking out the competition - plastic cartons of anonymous new potatoes and some 'Roosters' (lovely spuds, but not as fine-textured as the 'Kerr's Pinks').
I resisted telling her (and it was difficult) that the pink oval tuber in her hand is one of Ireland's two favourite potato varieties (along with 'Rooster') and that it was bred in Scotland by James Henry of Banffshire, and introduced in 1917, but that he made hardly any money out of it because he sold the entire stock in his storage pit before the potato was named or marketed, and that he emigrated to Canada, where he became a highly successful agricultural journalist, so he was okay financially, and that mashed is the preferred way of eating tatties for Scotland's - and possibly Europe's - most knowledgeable potato man, Alan Romans.
That might have been a little too much information at that particular moment in the vegetable aisle. But I'm delighted that I've been able to get it off my chest now. You see, having recently read Romans's The Potato Book, published last month, and having spoken to the man himself, I'm full of potatoes (in more ways than one: piggy little 'Pink Fir Apples' boiled and anointed with butter last night, and Irish-bred rubicund 'Rooster' tonight - cooking method yet to be decided).
Romans has been steeped in the marvellous tubers all his life: the farm where he was born, in Aberdeenshire, grew seed potatoes, and his home has always been on the east coast of Scotland, the heart of the seed-potato industry. As a boy he "picked tatties in the school holidays", and as a young biology teacher he "did a bit of roguing in the seed crops" (removing plants that don't conform to the standard).
His curiosity led him to collect scientific and agricultural data on his favourite vegetable. Before long, "I realised that there was a tremendous mismatch between the information supplied to domestic gardeners, and to farmers and commercial growers." So, when his mortgage was paid off, he gave up the teaching job of 21 years, and decided to devote himself to bringing his specialist knowledge to the man and woman in the garden.
Since then Romans has worked as a consultant to many of the major vegetable-seed companies, and a dozen years ago he instigated the now famous Potato Days at HDRA, the British organic organisation. The annual event celebrates the versatile tuber, with talks and demonstrations, and with 100 varieties on sale.
Recently he has committed a portion of his vast knowledge to the pages of his Potato Book, an expanded version of a guide he published with Thompson & Morgan. In it, he serves up a potted history of the spud, from its origins in South America to its place in the the world today; offers cultivation and storage advice; and demystifies gothic-sounding maladies such as blackleg, brown rot, spraing, scab, silver scurf and gangrene - and advises the gardener on how to avoid them. Most importantly, he describes and evaluates 150 kinds of potato, and presents data previously available only to the trade.
Potato enthusiasts can see at a glance how a variety scores in 16 categories, including yield, tuber shape, skin and flesh colour, and resistance to various diseases and pests.
A rating that will interest Irish spud lovers is that of "dry matter". Sounds boring? Yes, but listen to this: the more dry matter a potato has, the more floury it is. And in Ireland, we love our floury potatoes. Boil them, drain them, break them open and be engulfed by smoke signals of steam - puffing from the fluffy, light-catching snowflakes of starch, and relaying a centuries-old message of sturdy nutrition.
The Scots like floury potatoes, too, says Romans. "The whole world used to. But now only Ireland and Scotland are holding out." Tastes have changed, he explains, now that there is far less physical work being done. "But there is a sort of a glow and a feeling of bodily satisfaction when you work really hard, and someone sets a plate of really good floury potatoes in front of you."
The potato, emphasises Romans, is "fundamental to life itself, something that we in Scotland and certainly you in Ireland are aware of."
'Lumpers' (or 'Lumper'), the potato that was seen to fail the Irish during the Famine, was actually bred in Scotland. "It was a horrible potato," he says, with feeling. It was meant for animal fodder, "but it was prolific - well up to modern yields". A fact that is often missed, he reminds us, is that the bulk of the Irish population survived for 150 years solely on potatoes and milk, until the famines forced change. During this period, he notes in his book, "much worry was generated in England concerning the high number of inexplicably large Catholic Irishmen in existence".
Potatoes have inspired acts of bravery: during the second World War Russian scientists risked death from German shells to rescue tubers from plots on a breeding station outside Leningrad. And potatoes, claims the Scotsman, should have earned his fellow countryman Archibald Findlay a knighthood for breeding the three varieties - 'Up to Date', 'British Queen' and 'Majestic' - that saw Britain through two world wars.
Another of Romans's heroes is the 18th-century pharmacist Antoine Augustin Parmentier, who worked tirelessly to overcome French suspicions about the wholesome tuber (at that time thought fit only for animals - and Irish peasants). Parmentier is still celebrated in France for his endeavours. Alan Romans, whose efforts have advanced the noble, nutritious and historic potato a step further, deserves a few laurels of his own.
The Potato Book by Alan Romans is published by Frances Lincoln, £16.99. Visit www.alanromans.com to order unusual potatoes or a signed copy of Romans's book
ALAN ROMAN'S TOP POTATOES
Plant from March to May, after all danger of frost
FIRST EARLY (ready 10 or more weeks after planting; space tubers 30cm apart in rows 45cm apart): 'Karlena' (German-bred, tasty, floury potato with good disease resistance); 'Orla' (Irish-bred, waxy potato, "most blight-resistant early ever produced", disease-resistant, although not to eelworm).
SECOND EARLY (ready 13 or more weeks after planting; space tubers 30cm apart in rows 45cm apart): 'Kestrel' (Scottish potato with pale skin and "bonny blue eyes", resistant to slugs and partially resistant to eelworm); 'Saxon' (English-bred, creamy-fleshed potato, disease-resistant).
MAIN CROP (ready 15 or more weeks after planting; space tubers 38cm apart in rows 68cm apart): 'Sarpo Mira' (new Hungarian, red-skinned, floury potato, similar to 'Kerr's Pinks' in the eating; "absolutely bullet-proof against blight", resistant to slugs); 'Sarpo Axona' (sister variety of the above, creamier flesh, with fewer and larger tubers, "even more resistant to blight in my experience, it just seems to grow until the frost gets it"; both are exclusive to Thompson & Morgan).