In Seasoning: new potatoes
How terroir matters for more than wine - celebrating regional new potatoes
I’m proud even just to say I have seen the view from the back of a harvester as it drove across a field bringing up the very first earlies. The smell of potatoes newly out of the ground is like nothing else. They’re as fresh as fresh can be, challenging farmers to get them from the field to our kitchens as fast as possible, with minimal storage time, so as to retain their freshness & optimum flavour.
Their tasting of something has a lot to do with the land and climate they have grown in. It is a telling quirk of new potatoes that we often talk about – and respect – the region they come from more than the variety of potato itself as we would with maincrops. It is an acknowledgement of how much terroir matters to their flavour and texture. Jersey, Cornwall, Pembrokeshire, Ayrshire, Comber (where I was on the harvester...) are all feted for their earlies and it is because these areas’ unique combinations of soil and climate can make all the difference.
From: Seasoning - How To Cook and Celebrate the Seasons / Spring / New potatoes - First and Second Earlies
New potato season is go. And my urging (in Seasoning, here, anywhere I get the chance really) is for us to try to take a moment when buying them to consider their regionality. That can make such a huge difference to the pleasure they give. Not all new potatoes are equal - and the best ones are those that have grown in land that gives them extra oomph.
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