Potato Color

Potato Color

David Sparks Ph.D.
David Sparks Ph.D.
So, what’s in a color? Well actually color is extremely important if it’s your hair, or your eyes, or the sweater you’re wearing. But potatoes. Harvest a red, yellow, or purple specialty potato and its skin color will be shiny and bright. For example, purple potatoes are a type of fingerling potato native to South America. They offer more antioxidants than their paler relatives, and have an earthy and slightly nutty flavor. Yukon Gold Potatoes have a thin skin and golden interior. There are yellow fingerlings which are also known as Russian banana potatoes. Baby red potatoes are white as snow in the inside with a beautiful bright red skin that doesn’t need to be peeled off in most preparations.

 

So much for the rainbow potatoes in terms of color. But, store them a month or two, and the skin will be duller and so will consumer interest. University of Idaho, post-harvest physiologist Dr. Sanjay Gupta says potato producers who have potatoes that can’t immediately be sold run into difficulty. “The storage problem is there for a very long time…people have been struggling.”   Because rainbow potatoes “need to catch the buyer’s eye”— UI Extension Potato Specialist Nora Olsen once told me researchers are helping Idaho’s potato industry maximize their marketability. The team is investigating the in-season, harvest, storage, and packing processes that can potentially influence skin color and quality, including growth regulators, fungicides, harvest timing, disinfectants, and storage conditions.

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