Saturday 16 June 2007
Lessons for the novice potato hoarder
Storing potatoes in an ornamental configuration on your window sill will turn them green, and thus toxic, in the alkaloid-solanine liver-destroying sense of toxic. Preventative measures include wrapping potatoes in lightproof paper before placing on window sill, painting window panes black, or substituting with cricketballs.
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17 comments:
I like it when the potatoes have growths coming out of them- fascinating in a sick-making sort of way. I imagine green potatoes are similar (I'm pleased to say I am yet to reach that point).
I love a sprouty potato too! We have so much in common, Karen! Actually, one of my favourite things is the rampaging potato plant that emerges uncoaxed from the compost heap. Possibly second only to the garden-colonising pumpkin vine that emerges uncoaxed from the compost heap. Or possibly the yellow pear-shaped mini tomato vine that emerges uncoaxed from a compost heap on which you have never once deposited the seeds of a yellow pear-shaped mini tomato. Needless to say, I don't find the growths sick-making (though you shouldn't eat a sprouty potato; once they're on the go, they get slightly toxic).
"Sick-making" isn't the right word, but it is this sort of sinister thing, in a nice way. It reminds me of a growth or a cyst or, strangely, of those odd creatures who live in the very deepest depths of the sea- it's a weaker version of the same feeling when I look at it (does that make sense?). I would certainly relish the compost heap colonisers too, but the only things colonising the garden at the moment are the weeds Mr Pinhead* has coming over the fence.
*Yes, I'm a bad person for calling people names, but he's a rude, arrogant man.
Ook! No, I prefer to keep my potato sprouts and my cysts in totally separate conceptual categories.
"Mr Pinhead"?! No doubt he's been called worse. But maybe he just needs a friend.
When potatoes or onions start growing when your back is turned... it is fascinating, like Day of the Triffids in slow motion.
I never quite understood how sprinkling poppy seeds in an egg-cartoon and leaving it for a few days could produce alfalfa either, but there you go.
My favourite urban myth concerns this sort of thing: a woman sneaks into the bedroom where her boyfriend is asleep with her friend, sprays the carpet with water, and sprinkles it with poppy seeds. Then, apparently, when the couple wake up, they are greeted with a carpet of alfalfa!
Sort of a Malice in Blunderland fairy-tale.
Let me just clarify: I do not think of cysts while I eat potatoes, potatoes being one of my favourite sources of nourishment. Indeed, I am very fond of ranking the potato mash at various dining establishments, in the same was as I rank milkshakes.
Pinhead doesn't need a friend. He needs enough ethical sense to see that tricking the elderly man on the other side into paying for most of a fence is repugnant. People like that make Ms. D very cranky!
When my father did presentations about the carnivorous plants at various gardening societies, he would frequently show clips from Day of the Triffids.
Poppy seeds produce alfalfa? Talk about turning wine into water. Actually I have all the ingredients for this mischievous trick right here: carpet, poppy seeds, water, cover of darkness, everything but the philandering paramour.
Karen, a comparative table of potato mashes! What larks! I haven't had much potato mash lately, but I think it's best laced with a bit of dijon moutarde.
Boring lot aren't you! I grow parsnip tops in saucers, cheaper than plants. I conduct my speaking to plant experiments on them but parsnips appear to be completely deaf.
Is a pa-snip the same as a vasectomy?
Meaning no disrespect to either root vegetables or gents, of course.
I have not had my potato with dijion moutarde, so thanks for the tip. I'm also thinking of trying the pet parsnips, but might I not become too attached?
It's surprising the wronged lass in Tim's lovely little fairy tale did not simply deploy the old hand-in-a-tub-of-water trick- or shave their eyebrows or something of that sort. I don't see how alfalfa could really be sufficient punishment for the crime. My sister once met a Scottish lass who scratched "wanker" into the bonnet of her philanderer's car- I like her spirit!
Gosh! I'm more into spiritual rehabilitation than punishment, and I think a carpet of poppy sprouts would do the (spiritual rehabilitation) trick nicely.
Spiritual rehabilitation for whom? I'm sure scratching the bonnet of the bastard's car can be a very spiritual and rehabilitating experience!
I'm sure my policy would be the same, although I am happily yet to encounter a philanderer at close range.
Er, I mean the same as yours! I don't go about scratching cars!
Goosy, goosy gander,
Wither do you philander...
Upstairs and downstairs
And in my Lady's chamber, evidently.
And, of course, what's good for the goose is good for the gander, if the gander knows what's good for him!
'Meaning no disrespect to root vegetables or gents' Harlot, my dear, one and the same, one and the same.
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