GARDEN FRESH : Pick a Purple Potato

Does color taste?

Not in the mouth. But of course we also feast with our eyes.

Purple-blue is electrifying and seductive on a plate. Is that because it’s rare? I don’t think so. Have you yet picked up a sweet red pepper without jumping slightly from the beautiful shock? Or forgotten to stare at the brilliant orange of a persimmon? Not me. The kind of sunset that looks as if all the paint pots had been thrown into the western sky--no matter how many times you’ve seen it--still brings a gasp.

The color in “blue” potatoes, between skin and flesh, ranges from royal purple to amethyst to navy to peacock. When cooked, most flesh pales to the mauve of crystallized violets.

So what do you think about lavender whipped potatoes for Thanksgiving dinner? A friend has done it. They were, she said, “staggeringly beautiful,” but there were few takers.

What happened? Did the brain send a signal saying: “Whoops, dearie, there’s something odd here. Are you quite sure you want to eat that?”

Once a writer friend asked me to compose a dinner in black for a television comedy (to be served by a furious ex-wife). We managed, and no, I wouldn’t have wanted to touch a fork to that plate. But blue is the color of the sea and the sky, and purple-blue is the color of some of Mother Nature’s most delectable flowers.

So if those you love are so silly as to fiddle with their forks when the food has an unfamiliar color, whip up a heavenly blue mash (steam older blue potatoes, peel, put through ricer, and for every medium-large potato whisk in a generous tablespoon each of unsalted butter and hot milk) and blissfully eat them all yourself.

You might ease into the blue dimension by serving potatoes with blue skin but creamy white flesh. These cultivars are more common than those that cook up mauve, and some are particularly tasty. Caribe is one. Its snow-white flesh mashes wonderfully, and the potatoes are ready to harvest in a couple of months.

Purple Chief and Viking Purple are others. Blue Victor is an old-time blue-skinned potato. Seneca Horn is a horn-shaped potato from the Iroquois (but what I want to know is, how did it come to the Iroquois?), and light-purple Cow Horn is thought to be an heirloom from New Hampshire. And because I’m partial to yellow-fleshed potatoes, I love Round Blue Andean, with its purple ring inside the skin, like a ring around the moon.

But tasty as these may be, I find it a disappointment to cut into richly blue skin and find the same old white flesh. There are wonderful potatoes that are blue-to-purple through and through. I tried All Blue this summer, and it’s one of the most vigorous plants I’ve ever grown, as well as being delicious. Purple Peruvian, a mealy fingerling (long and narrow), is an excellent blue-blue keeper. Glacier is Alaskan, with rich-blue skin and blue flesh with a white star in the middle when you slice it.

So grow blue-fleshed potatoes, or track them down at the market, and create dazzling combinations for your table. You may find blue potatoes rather speckled inside, beguiling in a salad. Highlight the slices with shreds of red cabbage, slivers of carrots, flecks of chopped parsley, and dress with a vinaigrette lightly garlicked.

Old-fashioned creamed potatoes are celebratory when the potatoes are blue. Whether the flesh is white or blue, steam waxy potatoes in their jackets until tender. Without peeling, cut in large dice into a saucepan. You can slosh over half-and-half for not much more fat and calories than you’d have in a cream sauce made with low-fat milk. Heat until bubbling and finish with a dash of mace or nutmeg. Eat with a spoon as a course all by themselves.

Or, as an accompaniment to roast or grilled fish or poultry or meat, alternate overlapping slices of hot steamed blue potatoes with chilled red tomatoes, grate white or orange-yellow Cheddar cheese over, moisten with a thread of extra-virgin olive oil and sprinkle with chopped fresh sage.

If you think eating blue potatoes is sensuous fun, wait till you grow them! If you want a taste of potato gardening, start with two seed pieces for every five-gallon pot. Choose a broad-shaped container and maybe paint the inside white to let in and reflect as much light as possible.

Certified healthy whole potatoes the size of a small egg, bought from a seedsman, are best for beginning. But if you’ve found blue potatoes you like and they’ve sprouted, experiment with those. Each plant should yield at least half a dozen small potatoes.

Set the containers in full sun. Potatoes thrive in soil that’s on the acid side, so blend half azalea-potting mix and half standard lightweight potting mix from the nursery. Fill the container one-quarter full. Set potatoes three inches deep, with the most sprouts or “eyes” face down. Moisten soil thoroughly. Keep the soil evenly moist--never wet and never dry.

When the vines are six to eight inches tall, add four to six inches of soil mix, covering stems of the plants. Adding soil is called “hilling up.” This not only protects the forming potatoes from light (light makes the tubers green and mildly toxic), but encourages roots to grow. Continue doing this until the plants blossom. Then give the vines a deep mulch of straw or sphagnum peat moss.

Potato plants are charming. Blue potato vines have little blue stars of blossoms. You can let them dangle over the edge of the container, or send them up a small trellis.

Watch for slugs.

For baby potatoes, after blossoming--now comes the fun part--wriggle your hand down into the tub and delicately feel around. You can detach a potato from its root now, if you like, or if it’s too tiny, let it grow. (But if you scratch a potato, take it, as the wound may let in infection.) By the time the vines have yellowed and died, your potatoes will have matured. Harvest them without washing, and keep them in a cool, dark, dry place.

Potatoes are on the hardy side, so you can plant them two to three weeks before the last expected frost in spring. If you’re a stranger to frost, plant potatoes March through May--the time for most of Southern California. Where summers are very hot, plant potatoes March through April in the interior, March through July in the high desert. In the mountains, where I live, potato planting time is May.

Roughly within 100 miles of the ocean, you can plant potatoes again in July and August for harvest in early winter. And serve your own blue potato mash for Thanksgiving--when your family knows you’ve raised them, how can anyone refuse?

Sources:

Mail order potatoes for planting--Ronniger’s Seed Potatoes, Star Route, Moyie Springs, Ida. 83845.

*

Hot Indian summer days are the perfect time to relish the vibrance that’s still in the garden. Drenched in color and easy to compose, a Nicoise salad has long been a mainstay of my warm - weather entertaining. For one last al fresco luncheon or supper with friends, serve the salad on a big rustic platter (12 or 13 inches across). Violet potatoes are the blue note in a shimmering arrangement with olive, green, gold, crimson, bright and muted reds, rosy beige, ivory, jet and sunshine yellow. Pour a glowing chilled rose, and for dessert, an uninhibited pleasure of the season: Serve everyone a pomegranate sliced in thin wedges (use a stainless - steel knife--carbon steel stains the membrane) and sprinkled with rose water. Garnish the dessert plates with pink or red rose petals and offer finger bowls afloat with petals.

In planning, you can switch colors between the pepper and tomatoes as long as they provide red and gold. All salad ingredients may be prepared in advance, but arrange the platter just before serving so everything is glistening fresh.

SALADE NICOISE WITH BLUE POTATOES (Tuna With Half-Dozen Vegetables and Garnishes) 1 pound small to medium blue/purple potatoes (preferably with blue/purple flesh) 10 ounces small to medium beets with rootlets and 2-inch stems About 2 tablespoons oil 12 ounces whole stringless snap beans, trimmed if necessary Whole red lettuce leaves to cover platter 6 medium tomatoes, quartered 6 hard-cooked eggs, peeled, sliced in half 1 large sweet gold pepper, sliced in 12 rings 1 (14-ounce) can water-packed albacore tuna, drained, broken into chunks 1 (2-ounce) can flat anchovie fillets, drained 24 Kalamata or salt-cured black olives 3 tablespoons drained capers 4 nasturtium blossoms or calendulas, optional 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil 1/4 cup red wine vinegar 1/4 cup basil leaves, julienned Salt Freshly ground pepper

In pot steam potatoes until tender, 10 to 15 minutes. Cool, slice in half. In pot steam beets until tender, 20 to 25 minutes. Cool, remove stem and roots (leave skin, if tender), slice.

Add oil to large pot of boiling water. Drop in beans and stir. Return to boil over highest heat. Boil until tender-crisp, 10 minutes. Drain immediately. Drop into ice water to preserve color and pat dry. Be careful not to overcook vegetables. If prepared in advance, wrap and refrigerate. Rinse and dry lettuce.

To arrange salad, line platter with lettuce leaves. Make mounds in circle with potatoes (flat sides down), tomatoes, eggs (sunny sides up), beets, green beans (pointed toward center) and peppers. Set tuna in center. Make X with anchovies over each tuna mound. Fill spaces with olives in threes and fours. Sprinkle platter with capers. Garland tuna with flowers.

In small pitcher use fork to blend oil, vinegar and basil. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Pass dressing on side, leaving fork so each person can mix vinaigrette. Makes 4 servings.

Each serving contains about: 794 calories; 1,514 mg sodium; 346 mg cholesterol; 51 grams fat; 45 grams carbohydrates; 46 grams protein; 3.86 grams fiber.