Among store bought, I love Yukon Gold. When I tasted Yellow Haze ( thanks to Bob Vance), it blew me away. I sliced and baked it like Bob did.
@BobVance proably the person who can give you a better recommedation as he grows many varieties.
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@Moley/@mamuang,
Even baked in the microwave (without butter…), Yellow Haze is great. I think it is my favorite this year.
Two other fingerlings you may like are French Fingerling and Crimson Goldfinger. Both have a nice moist texture when baked and great flavor.
French Fingerling is pretty widely known (and sold by MPL). I got Crimson Goldfinger at a high-end grocery store (more expensive than Whole Foods, if you can believe that- sometimes when I go there I end up getting almost nothing). I wish I had gotten more of the CG, as I haven’t seen it since and it was very good. I saved two tiny potatoes and planted them. Today, I dug up the results and will keep most of it for seed. Here’s one I ate a few minutes ago…And yes, I did have six different colored potatoes for dinner. I should have cut open the red Amarosa on the left to complete the rainbow.
In terms of what is easiest to grow, there is Papa Cacho vs everything else, which mostly seem about the same so far. PC is big, vigorous, very long lived, and not very good to eat (quite dry). But in a survival situation where you need to live off the garden I would heartily endorse it. 
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Could be, though I’ve never observed them. Mostly, I see chipmunks (lots), squirrels, racoon, groundhog, possum, and skunk. Potatoes are one of the few things where damage is at a tolerable level.
@BobVance,
Blessed your metabolism. If I ever eat that much carb, I may look like a very large potato before I know it 
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I’m sure you’d be fine- it looks bigger than it was. Actually, it was only a “light” dinner, as I had already had some ice cream (couple Chocholate/Almond Haagan Daze pops) and was saving room for strawberries and watermelon. 
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Excellent thanks, when does the MPL open for spring orders?
I’m not sure- I often order in Jan/Feb. Maybe check back in October, when the potato harvest is in?
Just finished my Khatadins and Kennebecks. Very early this year. Some small red ‘early potatoes’. About to dig into my ‘La Ratte’, fingerlings. All were buttery and delicious. There is something about a homegrown potato that is so excellent. First of all it is the freshest potato you can get! Secondly I wait a few days before eating them, it seem to take a few days before the real flavor kicks in. All in all, they are sweet as nuts!
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I dug another bed’s worth of potatoes this weekend. At this point in the season, the bed is starting to look a bit ragged.
The overall bed-size is 2x12’ and I harvested over 22 lbs of potatoes, 105 days after planting (on 6/11).
11 Magic Molly- 7.2 lbs
7 yellow fingerlings from Whole Foods- 3.0 lbs
3 Borra Valley- 5.8 lbs
7 yellow fingerlings from Klondike- 0.8 lbs
7 Purple Majesty- ~6lbs (last weekend)
I also made a Youtube video of me digging them (sorry- it is a bit shakey). The Bora Valley plant in the video totaled more than 3 pounds. I got to thinking about what could have caused such a good yield and had a couple thoughts.
1.) I made the bed this spring and the top layer is from some old potted plants that I mixed in with the native soil. So, maybe whatever I dumped in that area had more/less fertility or better/worse drainage.
2.) I remember hand watering some this summer and there was one time that I just left the hose on the ground and got distracted by something. I over-watered that time, coming back maybe 5 minutes later. Thinking about it, I think the hose was about where the good yield came.
I think #2 is the more likely option, as I tried to mix everything in. Maybe I should try weekly flood irrigation when there is no rain in July/August. If I managed to replicate the results for all 35 plants, I would have had over 100lbs from that bed! That would be over 4 lbs per sq ft.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEaZT4Lm9Ro
It occurred to me that maybe the seed potato for that plant was bigger than the others, but I checked back and had a photo of when I planted. The red circle is that large plant from the video.
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Bora Valley - is that a russet?
There is also a pic in the above thread on August 14th. I think that the light was getting a bit dim in the recent picture.
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I placed my 2017 order at TMPL. This time, I got the following. Yellow Haze was the standout this year and is the only repeat. That’s not to say that some of the others weren’t good. I still like Magic Molly and Bora Valley impressed me with high yields (not bad flavor either).
I’ve still got a lot of potatoes down in the garage- they were great for Christmas dinner. It is 55-60 deg at the moment (it will probably go down to the high 40’s in another month) and they have kept well. I’ll probably replant some from last year, so I’m not sure if I need as many as I ordered below (a bit more than last year). But I want to try the varieties and will also share some with family, so I’m sure I’ll use them all.
Anuschka- Early German yellow, 2.5 lbs
King Harry- Sticky hairs on leaves which repel/trap insects (my dad has had issues with Colorodo Potato Beetles and wants to try this). White potato. 5 lbs.
Peanut- peanut shaped (maybe peanut flavor?), waxy fingerling, 3 lbs
Harvest Moon & Huckleberry Gold- Purple outside and yellow inside (like Purple Sun). 2.5 lbs of each.
Pinto Gold- New release with red and yellow patterns. Supposedly good taste and production (5 lbs).
Yellow Finn- Moist dark yellow, European (2.5 lbs)
Yellow Haze- Yellow fleshed from Wisconsin. My favorite from 2016. (5 lbs)
Bob, those sound great! I will not be growing potatoes where I live in France. I might try a container!
Hey bob, that is quite a lot of seed potatoes you must get a few hundred pounds at harvest? Do you use any special method or do you just plant and hill them up with dirt?
I’m actually not sure how much I harvested, as I ate a lot in dribs and drabs throughout the summer. I think I harvested about 60 pounds near the end of the season, of which I still eating now. This year’s order is a bit bigger than last years and I shared some of the seeds too. So maybe 100 lbs from 15 lbs planted?
Nothing special- I just do rows a couple feet apart and make long hills. Once they come up, I put down a lot of straw to keep weeds down.
Got my order from The Maine Potato Lady today. I went with peanut, adirondack blue, yellow haze, and German butterball. They’ll go in 10 gallon grow bags filled with leaf compost sometime towards the end of April.
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Great choices, especially German Butterball!
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Anyone grow red pontiacs? I always get huge red potatoes from them & bucket loads. Great tasting to boot, i grow then and the kennebec always big yields for me in zone 5b. Id be interested to try these purple ones you guys have as my girls would freak!
Family of 5 so they need to produce a hardy sum for me to want to plant them though.
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Check out Bora Valley, as I think it was the highest yielder for me. Earlier in the thread I mentioned that 3 plants produced 5.8 lbs.
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