Can you eat the leaves of a potato vine?
In the United States, most gardeners grow sweet potatoes for the big, sweet tubers. However, the leafy green tops are edible too. If you’ve never tried eating potato vine leaves, you’re missing out on a tasty, highly nutritious veggie.
What is a potato vine?
A potato vine, or Solanum laxum, is a climbing evergreen plant often grown in the U.S. and Australia. It is characterized by dark green leaves and white, star-shaped flowers.
Are potatoes safe to eat?
Potato tubers are considered safe when they contain less than 200 milligrams of glykoalkaloids per kilogram of tubers. Berries may range in glykoalkaloid content from as little as 177 mg/kg to 1350 mg/kg or more ( Coxon 1981 ). Some people begin to experience symptoms of toxicity at about 1 mg per kg of body weight ( Ruprich 2009 ).
Do sweet potato vines produce food?
Certain varieties of potato vines and sweet potato vines (Ipomoea batatas, which thrives in USDA growing zones 9 to 11) are grown as food crops, while others are for ornamental purposes. Most sweet potato vines produce potatoes (they are actually called tubers).
Are potato vines poisonous to humans?
Flowering potato vine (Solanum jasminoides) is a tropical plant with fragrant blooms that last throughout the summer. This showy plant with elegant white or blue-tinged flowers adds interest to a garden space but is also toxic to pets and humans if ingested.
Are the sweet potatoes that grow from sweet potato vines edible?
If you want sweet potatoes to eat, the tubers from your ornamental sweet potato vines are indeed edible.
Can you eat potato vine roots?
The purple tuberous roots are edible but gardeners who have tried them, say they're not tasty. Some gardeners try saving the tuberous roots overwinter much like dahlias. They store them in a cool dark location.
How do you store potato vine tubers?
Dig carefully and be careful not to slice into the tubers. Brush the soil lightly off the tubers, then store them, not touching, in a cardboard box filled with peat moss, sand, or vermiculite. Place the box in a cool, dry location where the tubers won't freeze.
Are ornamental sweet potatoes edible?
If you want sweet potatoes to eat, the tubers from your ornamental sweet potato vines are indeed edible. However, you're better off choosing a variety that's specifically developed as a food crop. That's because sweet potato varieties for eating have a much better flavor and texture than ornamental types, which can taste bitter.
Propagating Ornamental Sweet Potato Vines
Whether you want to eat them or not, it's worth saving the tubers to grow new plants for next year. You can store them like bulbs and plant them in containers the next spring. After you've cleaned out your containers for the season, rinse off the tubers and let them dry completely.
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Are Potato Leaves Edible?
Irish potatoes belong to a family of plants termed deadly nightshades, while sweet potatoes are part of the morning glory family. Both sweet and Irish potatoes are healthy and provide many essential vitamins and minerals, including Vitamin A, B, C, K, calcium, and iron.
Are Sweet Potato Leaves Edible?
As Sweet potatoes don’t belong to the nightshade family, you can eat their leaves which are rich in fiber, iron, and potassium. It’s believed that the leaves of sweet potatoes can be used to treat metabolic issues, skin irritations, and rashes, and insect bites.
The Health Benefits of Sweet Potato Leaves
Sweet potato leaves are very nutritional and are excellent for health. They can also be used to support weight loss as they are low in calories and contain fiber. Sweet potato leaves are high in Vitamin K, which stops the calcification of hard deposits in the arteries and reduces inflammation in the blood vessels’ cell linings.
Growing Potatoes
If you have your own allotment or vegetable patch and are growing potatoes, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on the condition of their leaves. Looking at the leaves will tell you if your yard is likely to have an insect infestation in the near future.
Conclusion
Whether or not you can eat potato leaves depends on which type of potato leaf you’re talking about. You can eat sweet potato leaves raw or cooked and can add them to smoothies, salads, or stir-fries. Sweet potato leaves are very healthy and are commonly eaten in the developing world, including the Pacific Islands, Asia, and Africa.
Are Sweet Potato Leaves Edible?
So, are sweet potato leaves edible? Yes, definitely! Next question: what are “camote tops?” The vines of sweet potatoes (especially the deep purple varieties), are known as camote tops (or kamote tops) in Spanish-speaking countries.
Why Eating Potato Vine Leaves is Good for You
Potato vine plant leaves are packed with nutrients. For starters, the leaves are an excellent source of antioxidants and contain high levels of vitamin A and C, as well as riboflavin, thiamin, folic acid, and niacin.
Growing Sweet Potato Greens
Of all the potatoes, sweet potatoes are easiest to grow. Plant the sweet potato “slips” in spring because sweet potatoes need four to six months of consistently warm weather. Sweet potatoes prefer sandy, well-drained soil, full sun, and plenty of space for the vines to spread. They love heat and won’t tolerate chilly weather or heavy, soggy soil.
How Toxic Are The Berries?
Potatoes form toxic substances called glycoalkaloids . They are produced in small amounts in the tubers, but typically much higher amounts in the foliage and the berries.
What Do They Taste Like?
I have tasted quite a few berries. You won’t poison yourself by tasting and spitting them out. There isn’t that much glycoalkaloid in them. I still don’t really recommend that you do this though and you should make certain that children don’t. Unripe berries taste a lot like green tomatoes, but have a much stronger bitter aftertaste.
Should I Remove The Berries?
Probably not. It isn’t a common practice. If you have young children and you are worried that they might eat the berries, that is probably the best reason.
What Are They Good For?
As with many plants that we normally propagate from vegetative parts, like tree and small fruits, asparagus, rhubarb, sweet potatoes, and others, the seeds of potato plants don’t grow true. That means that when you grow a plant from those seeds, the tubers are not the same as what you started with.
When Do You Harvest the Berries?
If you want to harvest the berries and extract the seeds, the best approach is to wait until the berries ripen and fall of the plant. Just collect them off the ground.
Will The Berries Lead to Weeds?
Maybe, but it is more likely that you will have problems with plants growing from tubers that you missed than from seeds. If you don’t collect the mature berries and allow them to fall on the ground, some will rot and release their seeds into the soil.
How Do You Get the Seeds Out of the Berries?
There are several ways to go about this. The simplest is to wait until the berries are fully ripe and very soft and just squeeze the seeds out. You can also use any method for saving tomato seeds.
