January 11, harvested the small row of Jicama in the upper garden. This was totally an experiment. I had bought jicama in northern california and liked it, a crunchy and mildly sweet addition to a salad. I had no idea how it would grow here in Ahualoa. It was planted in June, so it took more than 6 months until it died back ready for harvest. The good news is it made huge, beautiful tubers:

The bad news: these jicama are perhaps too crunchy (one might say gritty), too watery, and terribly bland. Perhaps they have to grow in a drier or sunnier climate to get sweet.

January 18: Harvested the second of the 2 yacon plants in the upper garden. Absolutely incredible – i pulled a total of 55 lbs. of tubers from the ground, from one plant! And they’re delicious. I read that yacon get sweeter if you allow them to rest for a month or more after you harvest, and that appears to be very true. Right out of the ground, they are super juicy but only vaguely sweet. After resting a month, they are noticeably sweeter.

Along with the massive tubers, this one plant also produced enough purplish “planting tubers” to start 40 baby yacon in pots in the greenhouse.

I’ve fed the jicama and the yacon to my family, and the yacon is the hands-down winner. Nobody wants to eat the jicama, although our neighbor Theresa took some to stir-fry.