Viking Purple is an excellent storage variety, allowing you to enjoy more of your crop over a longer period. It produces mostly 3 1/2 to 4-inch round tubers, but will occasionally wow you with a few whoppers. Compact plants are great for growing more potatoes in less space, and offer excellent resistance to scab and tolerance of heat and drought. Each 2½-pound bag will sow 20 to 25 feet of row and yield more than 25 pounds of potatoes. They're simply the best way to grow Potatoes!

Like all Potatoes, Viking Purple fares best in sandy, enriched soil, but if you have heavy or clay soil, just used a raised bed or plant the tubers more shallowly, mulching them well with straw. Here's how to grow them:

If your soil is normal to sandy, work in some gypsum and Epsom salts before planting, then set the tubers 3 or 4 inches deep and about a foot apart. (If your soil is heavier, plant more shallowly and rely on mulch rather than soil for coverage.) Potato tubers should be planted in early spring, at the same time as you sow your green peas. If a late frost threatens, just toss a few inches of straw or other mulch over the young plants, and chances are they'll be fine. You can also sow potatoes in fall for an earlier harvest. When the shoots emerge, you may want to sow some bush beans alongside the young plants -- they'll keep the bugs down! Basil and Summer Savory are also fine companions that keep insects at bay -- I usually just wait to see which Potatoes didn't sprout, and fill in the gaps with these helpful herbs! (Of course, Marigold, friend to all vegetables for its ability to destroy more nematodes than commercial repellents, is always a beautiful choice too!)

Potatoes grow their fruit right under the soil, and over time the tubers may stick out above the soil line. This can cause greening, which ruins the flavor (and adds toxins to the Potato), so watch your plants and mound up more soil, straw, or peat moss as necessary to keep the taters under wraps! The plants may also bloom, and small, hard green fruits will appear when the flowers pass. Don't be tempted to harvest them -- they're toxic!

When it's time to harvest, begin at the outer edges of each plant and work your way in. You want to gently turn over the soil using a garden fork or blunt-edged spade, to avoid cutting into the potatoes. Store the spuds, unwashed and not touching one another, in a totally dark, cool place, where they'll last for several weeks. (You can eat them after they've sprouted; just cut away the inedible sprout and its eye.) Once you've harvested the crop from end to end, begin in a new spot and work your way through it from a different direction. You'll be amazed at how many spuds you missed the first time! 2½-pound bag of tubers to plant 20 to 25 feet of row.