I guess this could go into crops and gardens or some other forum category, but perhaps it will stimulate the thought to create a separate category. I know there are some here who prep for all kinds of things beside SHTF stuff, such as hurricanes and blizzards. We have to add in earthquakes and volcanos as well. Anyway, this woman is a fairly popular YouTube creator in Austria who is in danger of being cancelled there. She has over a million subscribers and some of you may have encountered her before. This video is her commentary on potatoes as a "prepper food" and she has begun a potato diet, forsaking grains but no all carbs. She sums a lot up that would take me many paragraphs to recite, and I don't agree with all she says , but I do with most. It is a short video, so I hope you will watch.
I found this article from 2018: Potatoes Have Landed on the Non-GMO Project’s High-Risk List Why are potatoes on this list? "Using a method of gene silencing called RNA interference (RNAi), the potato behemoth J.R. Simplot invented a GMO potato that hides bruises, or black spots, so they are more aesthetically pleasing to consumers. These GMO potatoes are being marketed under the Simplot Innate brand, found under the trademark White Russet."
I'm talking about the home gardener. Here is the results page summary I found linking back to a Canadian Master Gardeners page,but the page no longer exists: Urban gardeners cannot access commercial crop protection materials that provide good control of this disease. Potatoes grown in urban areas are sources of late blight inoculum that can infect potato fields located as far as 200 km away." For this reason, they strongly recommend NOT using saved potatoes or purchased eating potatoes.
I first saw this method in popular mechanic's magazine, when I was a teenager and tried it once. The hardest part was finding the tires. Most were not steel belted, and where recapped. It wasn't a big crop, but It was fun to try it! I never tired of the project. Popular Mechanics was a Super Magazine. We lived in the city, and my Uncle who lived in the suburbs got me a bale of straw, and helped me some. Growing potatoes in tires
A good instructional video on pressure canning. We have never canned potatoes by themselves, as they usually store fine here in a cool corner of the garage, but we do can them as part of stews and such. She was in the South (probably, based on accent) so she may not be able to cold cellar her spuds.
We have started growing potatoes in buckets this year due to age getting the better of me. We had a poor yield of potatoes last year--most in Alaska did--so we started some in buckets this year. I have tried growing them in tires, bins, boxes, and of course, directly in rows in the ground. We grew them both in the ground and in buckets this year. Buckets are easier for us older folks to harvest, but we had a better yield this year in the ground as well. If you choose to use buckets, be sure to drill a few holes in the bottom and place them where you can water them and allow for drainage. It is a good strategy if you live in an apartment with a balcony or porch, or even in a community garden if you have no thieves that could steal the buckets. We generally re-use our own seed potatoes for two seasons then buy new. Of course, one can re-use the seed potatoes for years, but you risk the Irish Famine problem if you do. Try to grow several varieties of spuds if you can do so.
As inflation continues to rear its ugly head and will worsen as the Middle East flares up, it seems prudent to pre-purchase whatever you will need in the next few months if you can afford to do so. Food would be my first priority and don't forget drinking water. Fuel would be next for those who have the capacity to safely store such things. Natural gas cannot really be prepurchased, but you can keep your fuel tanks and propane tanks full just in case. I have heard about seed shortages, but that may just be end of season stuff and this years seeds for planting next year just haven't been processed yet. Rice and some types of dried beans are starting to disappear from store shelves if those are part of your diet. No need to buy stuff you don't normally eat or that won't keep though.
I don't think we have ever done that. Some folks who have freeze dryers do that, but our only preserved taters are what are canned in soups and such.
We will polish off the potatoes in storage as they are just out of the ground But I might try drying a couple someday. Parboiling might keep them from getting dark in the process.