Have you heard of Purple fleshed sweet potato? I will try to find some to grow.

I like the Georgia Jet Sweet Potatoes. They do well here and have a great taste.

Here is a link that might be useful: GA Jets

I like Vardaman best for flavor, and they also have a bush habit rather than vining, so they're easier to cover to protect from deer (and they take up less space)

The only one I know not to bother with is Beauregard -- I personally don't like the flavor much, and others here have said the same.

Right now going with Red Wine Velvet and O-henry,But Dads favorite is Georgia Jet like wertach stated.

Trying to find Brazil White and Camote Morado(purple)slips,plants,But no luck yet...........

Considering Vardaman too,Like elisa said............Since my plans were to plant one 50 foot row next to the herb garden,The Vardamans would go well with the O-Henrys.

This post was edited by pappabell on Sun, Feb 16, 14 at 20:57

The reason I don't really want to grow the Georgia Jets is because they grow too big and too far away from the plant.O-Henrys and Vardamans grow mainly right under the plant.Great taste and less space.I have 2 1/2 acres,But don't like my gardens to be out of control.......

Thinking about Brinkley Whites also

Keep the comments coming in,But right now thinking I will do 10 feet of O-Henrys,10 feet of Brinkley Whites,10 feet of Red Wine Velvets,and 20 feet of Vardamans.

My favorite is one that is variously called Japanese or Korean Purple. Red-purple skin, creamy flesh with a nicely nutty flavor and drier flesh. But I'll like any sweet potato you put infront of me with some salt and butter.

I love the O'Henry when it is candied.

Have been thinking of a purple one also sunnibel 7

Nancy Hall needs to be added to this list. It is a "yellow" sweet potato grown for flavor.

The purples need plenty of heat to do well, you may not want to push your luck with them if you are north of Zone 7.

I would not dismiss Beauregard and Covington. They make fine crops in a wide range of growing situations, resist diseases, store well and taste like a sweet potato should. I think their quality is much better than Georgia Jet, which will lunker if you get an early summer heat wave.

Thanks planatus,With such a wide variety,its hard to come up with a few to plant a 50 foot row

Maybe you already know this, but there is a difference between the "purple" I mentioned, which does fine in zone 7 (here) and others which are purple-fleshed. The purple-fleshed ones are those that need more heat. The one(s) I like are sometimes called Korean or Japanese Red also.

I like the purple-purple ones too, but they don't keep well so I've never been too interested in growing them. I pick them up occassionally at the Asain market instead.

Has anybody heard of or grown one called Becca`s Purple?Only see it in one website........

I really like the purple ones. To me, they are sweeter and have more flavor. Also, they are keeping much better than the orange ones ( comparing them to Vardman, Centenial, Bunch PortoRico and Beauregard all stored in the same room). Generally speaking the purples ones are smaller around and a little longer. However, I didn't have my soil prepared the way I wanted to last year and I am hopeful that this year I will do a better job of that.

The picture is of a purple sweet potato pie before I put it in the oven. It is all natural color and that is hard for some people to believe!

I am increasing my purple sweet potato planting to over 500 slips this year. No one grows them around here and I have the niche market for them at our Farmers markets. I will also be increasing my orange slips to about 500-600. Mostly Beauregard, but I will continue planting the other varieties, just to keep back potato for slip production.

Jay

This post was edited by jrslick on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 20:11

I just found this thread, saw the purple pie. I have to have one of my own now, so I just ordered 12 purple sweet potato plants online.

wow yall,
I have been growing them in 3 ft square wooden bins. for like three or four years now,,,,,,, bottom layer is hardware cloth to keep out the voles etc,,, also there are ground hogs here
Plus adopted outside stray cat, tries to use them as litter boxes, so I had to put fencing over them and sometimes use screens too over the bins when newly planted etc...
I presently supposedly to have now Royal jewel, and something called Tennessee something, probably Beauregard
I grew some of my slips .yesterday planted more of them in my bins
only thing I use on my sweets ,to eat is coconut oil, organic that is. baked in the oven and sliced in big slices.. Peeled of course. I even give some regular sweet potatoes to my chickens...
Lots of flea market pot slips no one knows the names or kind sometimes.
I bake a corning ware full at a time of plain baked ones... and store them in refrigerator and eat them cold...
Candying any of them is blasphemy, LOL

I've grown close to 20 different sweet potatoes. I've dropped a few, but I still grow most of them.

In my experience the now standard orange fleshed varieties (Beauregard, Covington, Carolina Ruby, etc.) all have a very similar flavor and texture: mushy babyfood texture and totally uninteresting flavor, in my mind only suitable for dressing up with lots of other ingredients (casseroles, pies, added sweetners, etc.) and for frying into potato chips -- I think they make the best potato chips, particularly the best texture. The really orange fleshed common supermarket varieties used to be the only type of potato I knew, and I loved them then, but now that I've gotten to know other types, I've totally lost interest in the orange types except as chips.

The paler orange/yellow fleshed varieties (Porto Rico and Nancy Hall are the only varieties that I've grown that really fit that category) are likewise very similar to each other: moist but not mushy, and worlds better flavor than the really orange types. I typically eat Porto Ricos without even butter or salt, just completely plain, even room temp the next day as leftovers, and they're really good. I've shared them with lots of other people, and almost everyone else is equally impressed. I'd say one of those two (or maybe another pale orange/yellow variety) would be absolutely a must on any trial of different varieties.

The purple fleshed varieties I've grown likewise taste the same: neutral at best, varying a little bit in moistness. I thought the color was really neat for the first year or two. Now I want potatoes that taste good, and the purple fleshed varieties are way at the bottom of the list. I've heard rumor that until recently the purple fleshed varieties weren't grown (or selected) for taste but just for dye manufacturing, and based on the taste I can definitely believe it. If you're dicing up different color varieties in a mix a small percentage of purple ones might add some eye appeal without taking much away from the taste, but I'd probably recommend forgetting about them unless your goal is dye manufacturing.

The final category would be the white fleshed ones, and there seems to be more variation in flavor and texture between the white fleshed ones. I grow one local white fleshed variety that has a really moist texture almost like a Covington except with what I'd say is much more interesting flavor and white, almost green-tinted flesh. Another variety, White Triumph, isn't as productive for me -- I don't think it sizes up well enough for me, even in zone 7 NC -- but it can have great flavor. It's definitely drier textured. Red Japanese (called red just because of the skin) is also quite dry, and the taste is very good but very different from the White Triumph. It reminds me of something like plantains and roasted chestnuts. It's quite different from the other types. Liberty is similar to the Red Japanese. I don't think I like the taste quite as well, but it's probably the most beautiful potato I grow: purple-red skin and yellowish white flesh. It's prettier than the colors can describe. There seems to be a lot of interesting tastes to explore in the world of white fleshed varieties.

I'd particularly be interested in hearing from others that grow other pale orange fleshed varieties that I haven't tried yet.

I'd also like to hear if anyone has done side-by-side comparisons/taste tests with the really orange fleshed varieties and found any that aren't basically the same in taste and texture. The only differences I've really seen are in skin color, shape, plant growth habit, productivity. There's a local heirloom called Scott Orange that I think I like a little better than the more common types, but I still haven't found anything in that category that's half as interesting as a Porto Rico, Red Japanese, or White Triumph (unless it's deep fried into chips.)

cousinfloyd,, Have you tried O'Henry yellow?

I haven't tried O'Henry so far as I know, but I do grow a handful of varieties, especially varieties that I would call white fleshed, that I've gotten from various sources without knowing the proper variety name. Why do you ask?

I have been very happy with Covington this year based on its production and taste. I also have been growing a purple variety that I enjoy very much. Been saving my own slips for several years on the purples.

Cousinfloyd- I have grown the Porto Rico and I thought they tasted terrible and the production on them was almost nothing. We have tried them for three years, and each year has been the same. No flavor, no production. I have read they have good flavor, but my taste buds must be different. They are a no go for me. Glad to hear someone enjoys them. But I am sure when you talk about produce, what one person likes, someone else hates. That is why we must have more varieties.

Jrslick, I suspect our differing impressions of Porto Rico have to do with differences in how they grew or maybe post-harvest conditions that led to differences in taste. I sell them at a farmers' market, and I've gotten lots of customers hooked on them, even though most people are suspicious of the color at first. I've also shared them with dozens or visitors and friends who pretty much all think they're as great as I do. I have heard of other people having trouble growing them, though. They do fine for me, and I've grown them in a couple different garden spots with different soil types (relatively lighter bottom land and upland red clay.)

I know North Carolina is one of the best sweet potato growing locations, so I suspect you are correct. Keep up the good work. I am glad you found something that works for you.

cousinfloyd asked me so I am replying "if he had raised O'Henry."

floyd, I raised Nancy Hall many years as I don't like the mushy orange much. O

Henry is a very smooth yellow that is sweet. Nancy Hall is yellow but coarse. White ones have no taste.

I had a few dozen farmers' market customers come to the farm yesterday for a farm tour and sweet potato tasting. My wife baked thirteen varieties, and we tried to get everyone (at least the adults and older children) that sampled them to place check marks on little slips of paper we printed out ahead of time with the names of all the varieties. If I had it to do over again, I'd probably just ask people to assign letter grades to each variety, but the way we did it was to have people check either the first box to note a variety they'd want to eat all the time, the second box for a variety they'd want to eat occasionally for something different, or the third box for a variety they'd want to avoid altogether. Not everyone tried every variety, but tallying up totals from 24 customers that left marked sheets with us here is what our customers told us this year, in order from most best category votes to least:

Nancy Hall: 21-0-0

McDaniel White: 16-4-0

Porto Rico: 14-5-0

Ginseng: 14-5-1

unknown white #1: 12-8-0

Scott Orange: 11-7-2

Red Japanese: 10-11-0

Norton: 10-10-1

Liberty: 9-5-4

White Triumph: 8-8-2

Covington: 4-10-3

unknown white #2: 1-11-6

Purple fleshed #1: 1-6-11

We also offered potatoes for sale and weighed the boxes of each variety before and after. One customer buying a large quantity of one variety might have made these numbers less meaningful, but for whatever it's worth we sold the most of Nancy Hall, followed by Ginseng, followed by McDaniel White (which might have been even more except that we sold out). We might have sold more Porto Rico except that we sold bulk quantities of Porto Rico to a lot of our customers before the tasting, whereas a lot of the other varieties we hadn't offered until yesterday (due to having grown limited quantities.) Covington was the only variety that nobody bought any of at all after the tasting.

This was the most extensive taste test we've done, but we've done similar things before with slightly different results each time. I think some of the mixed opinions could be due to the fact that we needed 3-4 potatoes per variety to have enough for everyone, which means different people weren't all sampling the exact same potato. I don't understand this, but some potatoes taste noticeably better than others of the same variety. I think that was particularly true of Scott Orange in this taste test, for example, and possibly other varieties as well. I noticed that one of the Scott Orange potatoes was one of the best, in my opinion, but another Scott Orange potato was lousy. Based on past taste tests, I'd say Ginseng ranked unusually high this time: it normally ranks well below average. White Triumph usually ranks higher. It was the overall favorite in one taste test but most often Porto Rico takes the most 1st choice votes. Red Japanese is often the favorite of a minority of tasters, but it's never ranked higher than Porto Rico and Nancy Hall.

All of the tastings I've referenced are based only on potatoes I've grown in my location, with my post-harvest storage practices, etc., so I have no idea how well they'd translate to different climates, different soils, different post-harvest practices, etc., but I wouldn't be at all surprised if they varied a lot. Some varieties like Red Japanese seem to be subject to more differences in taste preferences, but Porto Rico and Nancy Hall, at least as grown by me, seem to be universally loved (and universally preferred to common modern-day supermarket varieties like Covington, Beauregard, Carolina Ruby, etc.), as the taste test we did yesterday would seem to confirm.

Wayne, someone that came yesterday suggested that what I'm calling unknown white #1 might be O'Henry. Maybe I can get a confirmed O'Henry to trial and compare.

If you think white ones have no taste, I think you should try more white ones. I think I might say that of Liberty, for instance, and maybe what I'm calling unknown white #2, but I think others like White Triumph can be very flavorful, albeit not in the same way as Porto Rico or Nancy Hall, for example.

For a good old-fashioned orange fleshed sweet potato I always have great success with Centennial.

Can anyone tell me what they are doing as far as post harvest practices? Based on this thread, I've bought a few slip varieties to try on my farm in Ridgeville, SC. Based on my limited experience, I do know they're not very good right at harvest

Ok so here is my harvest from last year, mostly GA-Jets

Now after harvest I crank up the heat in my "shed" to about 83F and let them cure at that temp for 1 week. After that the temp is brought down to 63F.

Yes, I forgot about the Humidity. I just put some Aluminum Catering Trays with water in front of the vent for the heater to keep the humidity high. It worked very well we are still eating the ones from last October, they are still very good.

Thank you. Got some Nancy halls on the way. My local feed store is sprouting some Covington, so I may try those as well. Cousin Floyd, you don't sell and ship slips do you?

Also, I logged onto here with Facebook. How do I get notifications? I've got about 3 more of my 20 acres plowed and limed, and don't have time to do much with it, working 6-12s right now at my reg job. But I'd like to come back here and learn if I could. Just getting started with sweet taters and'd like to grow a few good tasting varieties to multiply myself.

Mine is Nancy Hall. I simply just love the taste specially when its baked, its really sweet.

I used to raise Nancy Hall. It was fairly good, but kind of grainy. O'Henry is yellow and smooth as silk.

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What a silly question. The sweet potato grandma cooked was the best tasting.