Sweet Potatoes

I have a bed that's 5' x 9' where I grow only sweet potatoes. The next bed over is 6' x 10' and I grow only yams in that one.

We can't grow actual Yams in this country. They grow only near the Equator. Yams can get up to 5' long and look more like a branch of a tree with heavy bark. The flesh is white, and tastes nothing at all like what we call a "yam." I've never seen one. My wife saw some in a market on some island in the Carribbean. According to her and everything I've read, even if we could grow them here we probably wouldn't.

What we call "yams" are actually a variety of Sweet Potato. Super Markets used to have to label their Yams, "Sweet Potato Yams." Apparently they aren't required to do that anymore, as it's been many years since I've seen them labeled that way. "Sweet Potatoes," the more yellowish of the two, have a drier and coarser texture than the more moist and fine fleshed Sweet Potato "Yam."

We've been pulling both out of my beds since August, whenever we want them for dinner. The vines are still green and make a beautiful ground cover for the 6-8 months they're growing. I simply move the vines aside, brush around the base of the plant, and ease out as many as I want. I let them sit under the awning the rest of the day.

At dinner time, I wash them off, split them down the middle, rub olive oil all over them, and rub some Kosher salt on all surfaces. I put them cut side down in a cast iron pan, cover it, and turn the burner on medium for about 15 minutes. About half of the cut surfaces get blackened. After about 15 minutes, I turn them over, cover them again, and in about 15-20 minutes, when they're soft to a fork, they're done. We eat them just like a baked potato, blackened skin and all--a little butter, a little salt....YUM! 

Sweet potatoes/Yams are one of the most vitamin and mineral laden things we can grow in our climate. They make a more beautiful ground cover than the Ivy used for the purpose, and I'll easily get 100 lbs. or more from each bed.

Now I realize I could plant lawn in those beds, and have a nice lounge chair there under the tree. But I'd have to mow the lawn. I just plant the Sweet Potatoes and Yams in April, have a more beautiful site to look at than any lawn--and I don't have to do a thing from April through December, when the lovely things will be all gone. But they'll be back in the spring---for sure they will be back in the spring!

I've tried to encourage my friends who have lawns to dig them up and plant Yams and Sweet Potatoes. I guess it wouldn't be politically correct. It would be infinitely healthier, much more beautiful, enormously more beneficial to the environment, but simply not done.

I'll have to work on being more "politically correct." Or not.