Growing Bags of Potatoes

Nothing beats that taste of homegrown potatoes.  Here is how I grew several bags of potatoes, easily and without the back breaking work of digging them up.

The past couple of years I’ve grown potatoes in bushel baskets and containers and you just have to tip them out when it’s time to harvest them.  But last year all the containers were accounted for but I had been getting some big bags over the past couple of years and decided to grow potatoes in bags.  I was inspired by seeing huge bags used as planters at Canada Blooms last year.

I started with some seed potatoes, ones with good growing eyes on them, and planted them up in some big bags. The bags measured about 38 cm x 30 cm x 25 cm. To start with I only filled the bag about a third full, add the seed potatoes and covered them with soil.

As the shoots started appearing I covered them with more soil.  This continued till the soil was at the top of the bag and then I just let the plants grow.  I had snipped a few holes in the bottom of each bag before starting this process to allow for drainage.

I liked the ease of growing the potatoes in bushel baskets, but over the years the bottoms just broke out of them from use.  These big bags let me move the plants around to get the most of the sun.  One bag could easily be tucked into a small spot in the garden without any back breaking digging.  I think I’m getting to be a lazy gardener and looking for the best ways to still grow my own food without a lot of work.  One thing that worked great was moving them all into one spot when we went on vacation.   It sure made it easier for the gardening helpers to do the watering.

Once the plant leaves starting turning yellow you know it will soon be time to dump them out and enjoy some homegrown goodness.  It was so easy to get the new potatoes, just lift the bag into my wagon, tip it out, sift through the soil and find the potatoes.  I grew a few bags of red potatoes and a few of white potatoes.

I picked them a bag at a time, which gave plenty of potatoes for a couple of meals.   One of my favourite way to cook them is roasting in the over.  Cube the potatoes, coat in a little bit of olive oil, and add a seasoning.   We like paprika, garlic salt, and a bit of Italian seasoning.  While visiting BC last year we went to a Saltwest Naturals to see how they reclaimed sea salt from the ocean.  They make lots of delicious seasoning to add to veggies , pasta, and salads.  Another favourite way is to cook them on the bbq in foil packets.

I use my homegrown potatoes in lots of my soup recipes.

Growing potatoes in bags was a great success and I will certainly be doing it again this year.

Have you seen how I grow other veggies & herbs?

The Gardener Side grows: bulbs, corms & tubers, plants, seeds & seedpods, and veggies & herbs in different garden areas