bumping an older thread with lots of posts for you...

I've grown Jerusalem Artichoke for many years. What you said is basically correct. However, it's very different from potato in taste/flavor. It has the highest content of iron in all vegetables. The plant is tall and thin with shallow root, is easy to fall after rain/under wind. If you plant it in a pot, provide support for the stems. Good luck with your try.

I've had them in the ground here in the Southwest for 4 years now. They have spread some, but I have the room. I love them boiled and mashed like potatoes, but they taste even sweeter. They are near the surface, although I suspect there are many deeper than I have had to dig since they're so plentiful close to the surface. We also eat them raw with salt. The green foliage is very pretty and mine make a small, sunflower looking flower at the end of the season. They have been a very consistent, easy to grow crop.

We just started some and the way I understand it you can kill thm off if you distry the plants in the early spring before they start forming bulbs.
i think if you have the room they could supply a replacement for potatoes, but you will need more room than what a containor can supply. i put mine in a front flower bed and will mow down any that do spread beyond the wooden boundries of the bed.

thanks mmqchdygg very helpful

... and yes veggiecanner I have thought about that overgroth situation ,it is something to consider and keep in mind . I suspect I may give this a try over potatos ...and of course hopefully I won't have an overgrowth problem and if so then maybe I could feed the area if there is ever a disaster of some kind .

I decided to grow them too. Right now they are in a pot getting leaves and shoots, and will be transplanted soon. We are going to put them by a fence so it does not matter if they cannot be eradicated. They will simply be like a permanent type of hedge, with yellow flowers and edible roots.

Bobbo, I would buy some at the store and try them if I was you. I think they are delicious but not everyone likes them. We are also growing potatoes and plan to continue growing potatoes, so we will grow both. Well, at least until the JA take over and provide plenty of food for the whole neighborhood.....we'll see what happens. Good luck with your JA.

I am in a moist climate. I could understand that they might be better behaved in NMexico or Colorado. I have posted elsewhere that I have inadvertently produced bags and bags of them. More than half will be wasted. They need cold weather for storage, and things are heating up fast.

If you put them in any soil, you will get tubers. The yield increases according to the quality of soil, sun, and water, of course. I got good results from grow bags filled with unfinished compost, chicken manure, sand, some wood ash, and well, sawdust and grass. Kind of mixed up.. Just... whatever... really. I got fair results from builder's sand with a cup of compost per plant. If you like watching things grow, they are great entertainment.

They are good raw. Their texture is water chestnut or jicama-ish. Cooking is a little tricky. I recommend pressure cookers for use with them. Use them as you might rutabagas, or carrots?, or potatoes. Half and half mashed with potatoes is good. Curries with them are better than stews with them. Finding recipes is more difficult than growing them. In northern Asia, they are pickled, which seems to me to be a great thing to do with them. They would be awesome in a sweet pickle brine.

The stalks they produce are also awesome. I have grown them to three meters. The stalks are about as hard as okra stalks. After you grow a stand of JA, you have enough supports for your spring peas, no problem. I have used them for kindling too.

Oh Bobbo. You mentioned them as a disaster relief food. Well, yes and no. I have thought a little about this.
First and second year yields will be good, but the soil seems to be depleted thereafter. I suspect that they take a lot of minerals, principally potassium, out of the soil.

This might sound gross, but if you had some renewable supply of nutrients, such as sludge or some compost or manure, you could grow chokes forever and ever for humans or for use as fodder. They are great little food factories. Who needs soylent green when you have JChokes?

But if you plant a field of them, you had better start hoping for a disaster. Wink.