Super Sprouts, Rotten Spuds

Like many people I used to dislike Brussels sprouts. They were the once a year vegetable served with Christmas dinner. The token three sprouts had to be eaten or no pudding was allowed. They had to be eaten, after all they’d been boiling since November.

Brussels Sprouts coming along nicely – about ready to start harvesting

Two things changed me from a sprout hater to a sprout lover. Firstly, how they are cooked. Not boiling the flavour out and turning them into balls of mush makes a huge difference.

I’ve posted our basic method for cooking sprouts on the site and particularly for Christmas there’s a recipe for Brussels Sprouts with Chestnuts. I was told you can eat Brussels sprouts raw but I can’t say it’s to my taste. There is actually a recipe for a Brussels Sprout Salad on the site but it uses blanched sprouts rather than raw.

The second thing that changed my view on sprouts was growing them. As the one day sprout season approaches, the supermarkets offer loose sprouts or sprouts on the stalk.

The thing is, crops deteriorate as they sit in store. Some, like potatoes or garlic, can be stored well for months with no noticeable loss of quality but sprouts are a leaf vegetable and whilst they can be kept, fresher is better.

Buying Frozen rather than Fresh

In fact I’d rather buy frozen sprouts than supermarket fresh. Those “fresh” sprouts have been harvested some time before, I suspect often weeks before. However the frozen have been processed very quickly after harvest, within a day usually.

Best of all, of course, is home grown. Pop up to the plot and pick, then to the kitchen. Often within a couple of hours the sprouts are being cooked.

Sprouts aren’t particularly difficult to grow but they do need a long time in the ground. Still, one of the few vegetables that can be fresh on the table in winter. Theoretically available from September through March but practically November through February. See How to Grow Brussels Sprouts.

Rotten Spuds

Our potato crop wasn’t great this year but I think we’ve enough to last us until next year’s crop starts to come in. If I’m honest, some of the problems were my fault.

Some hollow heart, which is down to uneven water supply. Drying out and soaking. Slug damage was high. I should have been more proactive with slug pelleting. But rodent and rabbit damage down.

There was a bit of blight but the vulnerable varieties were mostly harvested before it struck and the maincrop Sarpo Axona are very resistant.

Normally I’d check the potatoes in store for problems monthly but not this year. It’s one of those jobs you can put off and I’ve kept saying ‘tomorrow’ until Friday when Val found a rotten potato. A horrid, smelly, mushy potato.

Well we took the sacks out of the rodent protecting box and emptied them one by one onto an old shower curtain on the floor. Mostly the potatoes were OK except for three sacks which had problems.

The problem sacks were pretty obvious from the outside as they had a wet stain. This was because the rotten potatoes were oozing liquid as they turned to stinky mush. The actual number of potatoes rotting was quite small, the worst bag had half a dozen. The problem is the rot spreads to the good potatoes in the sack.

The good potatoes from the affected sacks were cleaned off and left in boxes. That’s so I can keep an eye on them in case they develop problems. If they seem stable then back into the protected store.