The sweet potato harvest

The raised mounds of soil under the eight sweet potato plants in the vegetable garden were a clear indication that the sweet potatoes were ready for harvesting.

I had started picking some sweet potatoes from under the plants, much like collecting eggs from a hen on a nest of eggs. But Friday was the day for the big harvest. Fungai and I each scooped a big bucket of water from the canal with which to wash the potatoes after harvesting.

Fungai started by cleaning the soil from each potato with a hand-held garden fork before he picked them. That was far too slow for me. I just dived in with my bare hands. Wriggling each potato, I pulled them upwards and out of the soil to avoid any breaking-off of the sweet potatoes in the soil.

We were so excited. Each sweet potato that was pulled up was admired and discussed, but not for long, because there were more waiting under the soil. One plant provided a yield of 19 sweet potatoes.

The only one that was not impressed with our harvesting was a raucous toad that had made his home under the sweet potato plant foliage. He gave us a very disapproving look before climbing over the freshly harvested sweet potatoes and jumping in the direction of the strawberry bed.

We harvested three large containers full of sweet potatoes. After this, Fungai harvested another bucketful by digging over the whole bed to make sure that we did not leave any behind.

The cleaned sweet potatoes looked fresh and delicious. They are a pink colour that my brother-in-law informed me is Rhodamine Red. I will not argue with him because he is an ink colour expert.

Fungai was super proud of the harvest of sweet potatoes that he has cared for, for about six months. He was very impressed with the size of them. He informed me that I was far too conservative with the eight runners that I had planted and that we could easily plant 15 in the same bed.

With the sweet potatoes harvested and cleaned, Fungai eagerly appropriated some of the fresh sweet potatoes before I took the rest up to the loft where they will cure for the next two weeks.

The fresh sweet potatoes are delicious. However, their real flavours develop as they cure. This is apparently because the starches in the tubers turn into sugars during the curing process. This in turn intensifies the buttery sweet flavour and texture of the sweet potatoes.

Curing sweet potatoes is important if you would like to store them for a longer period of time.

We have swopped potatoes for sweet potatoes in most of our meals. It is much healthier and they are a good source of vitamin A, B1, B2, B6, and C, manganese, copper and pantothenic acid. They are also a good source of potassium, dietary fibre, niacin, and phosphorus. This makes them not only versatile and delicious but super healthy as well.

Fungai, one proud garden manager

With Fungai fired-up, we are now looking for different coloured sweet potatoes to plant.