Moxie Gardener

Fingerling potatoes--a rare find at the farmer's market.

Fingerling potatoes are smaller than regular potatoes and are shaped like fat fingers.  But they pack a whole bunch of flavor into those chubby “fingers.”  Available in purple and red, but most often yellow—like Yukon Gold potatoes—fingerling potatoes have a buttery flavor and waxy texture that make them perfect for salads and hot dishes.

Members of the Solanaceae family, fingerling potatoes’ Latin name is Solanum tuberosum.  They are native to the Andes Mountains in Peru, as are the more familiar, regular sized potatoes.

Fingerling potatoes are grown just like regular potatoes with an exception.  Don’t try to harvest them for “new potatoes,” in mid-summer—they won’t be large enough.  Wait the full 90 to 120 days potatoes take to mature, or until the vines start to die down in early fall, then harvest as full-sized (for them), mature potatoes.

Cut pieces of “seed potatoes” for fingerlings smaller than you would for regular potatoes.  Cut into pieces weighing approximately one ounce and that contain at least two “eyes.”  A pound of fingerling seed pieces will produce about 20 pounds of fingerling potatoes.  That’s more than twice the yield of regular potatoes.

Plant pieces of “seed potatoes” 4 to 6 inches deep and 18 inches apart in rows 36 inches apart.  Fingerling potatoes need loose, deep, sandy soil that has been improved with additions of compost, organic matter, and/or manure.

About 3 to 4 weeks after the sprouts emerge, hill up the soil, leaving only the top third of the sprout above the soil line.  Hill up again two to three weeks later, and keep repeating until flowers appear.  At that time, mulch soil with 4 to 6 inches of straw or other organic mulch.

Provide consistent moisture; even a brief dry period will produce smaller, misshapen tubers.  To control disease and fungus, water potatoes with a soaker hose rather than a sprinkler or other overhead method.

Fingerling potatoes are just as easy to grow as regular potatoes and they taste better and produce more.  Considering their premium prices at the supermarket and farmer’s market, they’re well worth growing in the home garden.