Storing Potatoes
Your Guide to Storing Potatoes
Properly storing potatoes is the key if you want to preserve them. If you plant your own potatoes, like to buy them in bulk or just want to preserve the bag of potatoes you bought at the supermarket last week, then you need to know how to store them properly. Storing potatoes properly can be the difference between nice fresh potatoes and root filled, hardened or soggy potatoes. If you love high quality spuds, you need to take proper care of them not only when you get them to the kitchen but before then.
Bag Them
First, you want to put your potatoes in containers. The best place to keep potatoes is in sturdy brown paper bags like the ones you might find at your local supermarket (for best results double bag them). Some people claim transparent plastic bags with holes poked in them work equally well, but I have found that these can give the potatoes a strange rubbery texture. Whether this is just a psychological effect, I do not know.
Be sure not to overfill the bags. You need to be able to fold them off on top. Another advantage that brown paper bags have is that they don’t allow sunlight in. Sunlight can make potatoes start to sprout roots.
A Clean, Poorly Lighted Place
The key to storing potatoes is location, location, location. A wine cellar or a clean basement works best. But be sure that you don’t have your water heater in the cellar with your potatoes. Potatoes like nice cool temperatures. If you let them heat up, you will start to get problems. Many potatoes will react to increased heat as a sign that it is time to start growing and roots will start popping from their surface.
Avoid placing your potatoes in musty corners or on the ground. Ideally, you want your potatoes as you want your wines—elevated off the ground and in the center of your space where they are least likely to incur damage. This location will keep them from becoming musty and unappetizing.
Keep them Dry!
One of the keys to success when storing potatoes is keeping them dry. If your basement floods during the rainy season, this may not be the best location for them, even in the summer. Wet dark areas provide a great breeding ground for funguses and bacteria, both of which would love a good potato to colonize.
Even if you keep the potatoes centered and elevated, you will still need to eliminate the fungus thoroughly or else risk spores launching an aerial assault on your potato stash. Even with this precaution, however, some fungi and fungal spores are likely to survive and put your potatoes at risk.
Beware of Rodents
Finally, be careful with you friendly, neighborhood house mouse. Rodents will gladly sample and then devour your horde of potatoes. So, if you want to make sure that you can have those savory baked potatoes you’ve been planning you will have to take measures either to keep your mousy friend out of the storage space or to end your little interloper’s days as a pest.
You certainly do not want to come down to get your potatoes only to find your bags in tatters and your potatoes nibbled up.
A Potato Shelf
If having fresh potatoes is a priority for you and your family, you may want to build a special shelf for your potatoes. Ideally, you should construct this shelf from metal and place it at the center of your storage room. You should have enough space so you can place your potato bags comfortably on the shelves. It should also be elevated off the ground.
Follow these guidelines and you are sure to have great fresh tasting potatoes at every meal.