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Vegetable Gardening

Best storage varieties

15 years ago

What are your favorite vegetable varieties for long term storage? Particularly interested in potatoes, garlic, and dry shell beans, but would also love to hear about others- parsnips, corn, carrots, whatever. Even those traditionally eaten fresh, like tomatoes, cucumbers, & melons, if you've grown a variety that "kept" much better than typical for the type. Not processed (canned/frozen), but "as-is", cured, or overwintered in the ground type stuff.

Thanks!

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Comments (3)

Macmex
15 years ago
I've never met a parsnip which wasn't good for storage : ) Just be sure to keep them in the ground and mulch so you can get them out when the ground freezes.

As far as tomatoes go, I've had experience with three kinds.

1) Long Keeper, I believe by Burpee: My father grew these for a while. They keep a good while, though I didn't care for the flavor.

2) Sunray: Orange tomato with good flavor, solid. Not many mention the fact that this one will last for weeks on the counter, even when ripe. I haven't tried the comparison, but I bet Long Keeper keeps longer.

3) Polish Pastel: Yellow/orange/red swirls in a medium sized plum/paste tomato. Extremely dry flesh. Here in hot Oklahoma, I'm on my third year with these. They always seem to be light on production until the cooler nights of late summer and fall. Then they produce A LOT of tomatoes on very large plants. Seed production is scant because the fruit have so few seeds in them. Once ripe Polish Pastel keeps for at least a month, at room temperature.

Any larger c. moschata squash should be a good keeper. I once grew melon squash which were still good door stoppers 15 months after harvest. We regularly grow a squash called Warsaw Buff Pie Pumpkin (WBPP), which is just large irregularly shaped butternut. WBPP will keep well for about 9 to 10 months.

Most any beet will keep well if mulched. But they will bolt to seed in the spring if you haven't eaten them.

George
calliope
15 years ago
I always do three types of onions.......bulb, shallot and leek. I go through the bulb onions fairly quickly, but there are varieties you can store for quite awhile, as opposed to the soft salad type onions like Walla Walla. I still have shallots I harvested last year hanging from the kitchen fireplace. I braided them and they are as juicy and delicious as they were when I pulled them out of the ground. Wonderful keepers. As for the leeks, I use them until the ground freezes very hard in January. Then switch to the shallots.
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Dry them? I did that with potato slices and dipped then into a sulfur based solution to prevent them from blackening. Melons, except water, can be frozen as this was just mestioned yesteray in another thread. Corn will not keep well, unless frozen. I blanch, the cut off the kernals and freeze, also recently mentioned elsewhere. Storage also depends on if its dry, cool, and dark in the storage area.
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gregbaker
Original Author
15 years ago
Thanks for the replies.

My supply of Waltham's butternut squash is long gone, but my parents still have several from my crop last year. They show no signs of going bad, 10+ months now.

Grew Red Pontiac potatoes this year, of course it'll be awhile before I can comment on their storage quality. Just now getting ready to dig.

That's good to know about the parsnips & shallots; I'm considering both for next years garden.

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