Oca, Mashua, and Yakon Harvest Reveal

[@BumblebeeAdventure]

🐝 Thanks for the great video 🌻 nice harvest!!

[@spudsandroses]

Thank you very much 🤗💚🌿

[@gedhuffadine1873]

I was searching for oca growing and came across your channel. Really enjoyed, just subbed. Thanks. Ged from England.

[@spudsandroses]

Thanks a million 💚🌿 A good plant to grow and harvest 😊 I'm growing it this year in a much larger planter, and the foliage growth has been exceptional. Fingers crossed 🤞 for January harvests 😊

[@TheGrowUpChannel]

My mashua was the same! Those oca looked amazing! Welldone! Like you said.. its all an experiment. Danny ❤

[@spudsandroses]

Thank you, Danny 😄 Yes indeed. It's all an experiment, and as you don't like Kale, maybe oca will become one of your new favourites 😉😂 Best wishes, Maiju 💚🌿

[@katiekat6768]

Absolutely love your videos… so informative and interesting…. great crops, they looked amazing… well done 🤗❤️ x

[@spudsandroses]

Thank you so, so much 🤗 Really kind of you 🥰 Have a great weekend!Best Wishes, Maiju 💚🌿

[@joanflemmingkendrick1107]

I will be harvesting mine tomorrow, which is in a raised bed. I wanted the frost to kill off the foliage, which it did last night. I covered the plant for tonight to protect from the frost. I'll let you know how I fared tomorrow. Two oca plants would have been enough for the large pots to allow for the growth of larger tubers. The yacon should also have been planted in a much larger pot, which would have yielded a much larger tuber and more rhizomes to have more plants for next year. I grew all of mine extremely well outside. There is no need to grow it in a tunnel in Ireland. Great video! 🤗🫠

[@spudsandroses]

😅 Thank you, Joan. I was so minding yacon, like having a baby 😂 not really sure why, maybe because it is still rare? I had a little taste of raw oca, and it was very pleasant 😋 delighted about it 😀 as i only have 3 mashua tubers to taste, have to plan that....I like to get my husband and son taste anything new I grow and they'll give me their honest opinion, am I wasting my time with a particular veg or not 😅 as the aim is really to be growing what we'd all like to eat 😊.So good of you to comment about these plants and that you're successfully growing them outdoors, and that you had a bumper yacon harvest 👏👏 Hopefully tomorrow's oca one is also a success 🙌 😊 Have a great weekend and stay warm, its a chilly one 🥶😄 Best wishes, Maiju 💚🌿

[@ashm5206]

I’ve been looking forward to seeing how these worked out. The oca look great!! My mashua were a total failure, not even a single tuber to replant next year! My oca were moderately successful considering the early frosts we had here. I’m hoping to retry both under cover next year. I had never heard about rotation of oca. I grew it for 10 years in Dublin and it had perennialised in both a raised bed and the greenhouse, I never had any issues with disease. I did however have terrible wireworm issues with potatoes growing there so maybe it was related to the oca!!

[@spudsandroses]

Hi and thank you 😊 the Oca look so pretty 😍 and plenty there, but same with Mashua, poor outcome 💚 The rotation comes to play with potatoes, if you're using the same ground for oca one year and potatoes the next etc. same with Ulluco, that apparently they've some shared diseases...but the main reason I started to look into growing oca was that it doesn't suffer from blight, which is the main potato problem here. I couldn't say I would replace the potatoes with oca.....😀, we def love our spuds still ❤️ 😀 but as raw taste goes, it is very pleasant 😊💚🌿 Maiju

[@dogontheplot]

Oh here we go!!! This is the ep I've been waiting for! 😂 Great oca harvest and really interesting to see the results of the mashua and yacon. Very informative too - thank you Maiju. I'm playing chicken with my oca now. Real Seeds instructions say wait at least a week after the foliage has been killed off, which I have - but they're in the (frozen!) ground and I'm worrying about them. I think last year's rotted from getting too cold and wet in a tub. Hmm... I might go out and root around a bit ... 😂 Lovely video as always 😊❤

[@spudsandroses]

Hi Kerry, You're a sweetheart 🥰🤗 Thank you so much! So sorry to hear about your back last week. There's nothing worse than being held back by these "work related" injuries on your days off 😪 I know it too well....🤗 Hopefully, you'll be back in your usual self soon again 🥰 Now, back to the Oca 😄 - there's never any harm in poking around, we are nosey and curious 😀 I had a little taste test of raw oca, and it is very, very pleasant. Really crunchy and no strange side tastes at all 😀 Im already thinking of an area where I could plant it outside, not having it in the pot next year as it seems to really want to stretch itelf under the soil 😀...💚🌿 I hope you're having a lovely weekend 😊 Best wishes, Maiju xx

[@theflyinggardener]

Thanks for sharing Maiju.......really interesting.......I especially liked the look of the Yakon.....could be something I would try in future!🙂💚💪

[@spudsandroses]

Hi Will 😊 all the 3 are intriguing so far..Still haven't tasted them, I'm letting the sugars settle in them, but to have something different in small quantities for the winter season 😊 I'll let ye know what reaction the family is having to them 🤗 Have a great weekend 😊 Maiju💚🌿

[@rrichards1210]

We love oca/ NZ yams. I do find them tricky to grow to a good size (mine were barely bigger than peas last year) but they are so delicious they are worth growing. We can buy them in the supermarket at certain times of the year and love them roasted. I found yacon easy to grow last year and got a decent harvest from the few small pieces I was given. I now have 2 large buckets of plants and hope to harvest enough to try making syrup.

[@spudsandroses]

Hi 😀 We're having mixed reactions to all these exotics 😅 I personally like the Oca, perhaps more roasted than raw, my hubby is just the other way...the Mashua tastes like wasabi when raw (def 10x more punchy than radish 🫢) but really mild when roasted, not spicy at all, just little aniseedy....and Yakon is very pleasant, not that sweet at all, but definitely worth to grow 😊 I will try to grow all of them again next year and see if we're getting better at their usage 💚🌿

[@rrichards1210]

@@spudsandroses I didn't find the yacon sweet either. Apparently it has many healthy attributes being very good for gut health. I'll grow it for that purpose as it's easy to add into coleslaw and salad.

[@spudsandroses]

@rrichards1210 I'm there with you about the gut health and as a crunchy salad addition 😀 or in stir frys 💚🌿

[@joanflemmingkendrick1107]

The yacon makes a fabulous syrup which is a fantastic substitute/alternative to honey, sugar, etc, and much better for you. It tastes like sugarcane or even molasses. 😋

[@NATURALBEEKEEPERSCOLLECTIVE]

Awesome video. How can your doggy look so comfy and relaxed sleeping on gravel hahaha If you plant the mashua in the ground it should grow up to 20 feet tall. The black seeds from Mashua are delicious pickled. You can dehydrate the leaves and powder them up. Almost as good a s pepper. I think maybe yours is small becaus ethe roots are restricted and it can root down for minerals etc .If you saved some of the roots try replanting a few in the ground and some in the pot and compare them. They also grow faster if you give them some thing to climb up. and keep the ground moist but not water logged. If you are storing the Mashua roots wait until the frost has completly killed the tops. The roots will not be killed but they will go dormant. Other wise they will sprout in storage and not keep for long unless replanted. That bit is important.

[@spudsandroses]

Thank you so much for this amazing comment 😍....using the powdered leaves a pepper replacement is very interesting 🤓 I did pot up the immature roots and have noticed a couple of tiny new leaves already sprouting from them (not that's ideal, as they're in the greenhouse and we were hit with -3c frost overnight and I don't have them covered) ... How do you prefer to eat the mashua tubers themselves? Best Wishes, Maiju 💚🌿

[@JBNat]

You have such soothing videos Maiju. Really interesting reveals, three I know very little about! Where did you get the yakon from? Would love to give that a try next season. Any idea why the Mashua plant didn't do so well?

[@spudsandroses]

Hi JB 😊 Thank you so much for your lovely comment 😀 ....because of your foxes' nighttime videos, I'd love to have a trail cam in our garden. It's fascinating to see what the wildlife is up to behind our backs 😀 I'm really delighted how the plants turned out. Yakon has been used to make syrup out of too and is a suitable fruit/vegetable for diabetics as a natural sweetener. I got the original rhizome from a local vegetable grower and when I was enquiring about it, they offered the oca and mashua too....my pre-order for red Yakon just got confirmed 👌 and I ordered it from another Irish supplier- Gardens for Life. I have not tested any of the 3 on my guys yet, so I cannot say if it's thumbs up or down yet 😊 but over the next week I'll be trialling them and can let you know 😊 Have a great weekend!Best wishes, Maiju 💚🌿

[@joanflemmingkendrick1107]

I got my yacon and mashua from gardens for life also. Martin offers a great selection and not far from where I live. I hope to be making syrup in a couple of days after a bumper harvest with more to come.

[@spudsandroses]

Sry, realised I didn't reply about Mashua -I think a couple of the original tubers were not that great (you'd see a clip in the vid) but otherwise it looks like the plants were rearing to get going, only me yanking them out 😄 and being nosey. The rootball/pot was full of fibrous roots, and soil was loose, and a good amount of tiny babies on roots, so I think too little time to mature 😊 next time I'll be more patient

[@thetinygarden_]

Hey Maiju, so nice to see another gardener in Ireland 🙌🍀 I found you through Niall's Instagram post earlier this week! I signed up to the Irish Seedcret santa and I recieved Oca in my parcel so this could not be a more fitting video right now because I didn't know what it was let alone how to pronounce it. Lovely video and your dog is gorgeous, if you don't mind me asking what breed is he? All the best, Laura x

[@spudsandroses]

Hi Laura 😀 Thank you very much for your kind comment. I'm in Kerry, where are you based? It was the very first time of growing Oca, so totally experimenting and trialling 😃 Do read the comments as there are great tips from another viewer, who has grown it before 💚 Our dog is a purebred Mutt 😂 His mum was a champion line Boxer (our own dog) who fell in love with a sheepdog across the hill 🥰 😂 Good strong stock 😂 I'll pop over to your channel now 😉 Thanks again and have a great weekend! Maiju 💚🌿

[@thetinygarden_]

@@spudsandroses I am from Waterford Maiju! We call it the sunny southeast over here, but that's not happening right now with the grey skies 🤣 one of my best memories since moving here was in Kerry. We started in Kinsale, drove via Bantry and up the Wild Atlantic way up to Killarney and stayed in the Danny Man, I think I still have my hat and snood from the woollen mills. I can't get over the story about your dog, that is hilarious!!! 🐕🧡

[@spudsandroses]

The wild Atlantic Way is so stunning 😍 We ourselves would be closer to Killarney and Dingle than lower South-West, but we also adore Bantry 🥰 It has been a while since we were in Waterford 😊 Love your dog Roo's playfulness, she looks like a real softy 😍🤗❤️❤️

[@adysveggarden]

Hi Maiju, That's a great return for the oca, it looks like a nice ratio for pot to seed per tuba would be 10 liters?

[@spudsandroses]

Hi Ady, Thank you 😊 The oca did do much better than mashua indeed 😊 I had 5 tubers of Oca and the pot was a 30 L, same as my main crop potatoes bucket....but as another viewer, Joan commented, 2 would have been better for larger tubers 😊 and she's spot on as you see me struggle to even break through the rootball 😂

[@joanflemmingkendrick1107]

Pity about the mashua. You really ought to have left them in the pot until the foliage died down altogether. It is very hardy and is best left until January/February to allow the tubers to grow larger. They are delicious raw in salad grated or chopped in a salad 🥗 and really lovely roasted.

[@spudsandroses]

Yep, I totally agree. I was too eager 😁 the plants wanted to grow more. But I did pot all of them up into smaller pots (individually x4) and I'm going to keep them like that until next season. How do you overwinter yours?

[@joanflemmingkendrick1107]

​@spudsandroses I keep it in a dark cool place. It will stay in the ground over the winter. Just mulch it with straw or bark. It is very hardy in our climate.