This morning I had the pleasure of making homemade hash browns and harvesting red potatoes that I grew from scraps. It was the first time that I attempted to grow potatoes using this method and it was very simple. In fact, I’d highly suggest that you try gardening using this method if you’re new to gardening and want to plant something where your chances of it actually yielding will be high AND you don’t have to spend a lot of money and/or time maintaining it.

I started these red potatoes a few months ago. I can’t remember exactly, but I think it was late January/early February. I had 3 red potatoes that began to grow “eyes.” Most of the times, depending on how much eye/buds have sprouted, I’ll just cut them out and cook the rest of the potato or (I hate to say it now) throw it away. This time, however, I said to myself, why not try to grow some red potatoes…from these potatoes?!

First, I cut them into about 10 pieces to separate the eyes/buds. I then let them dry out for 24 hours. Next, I placed them directly in the dirt, in a plastic bucket. (My back yard gets lots of critter visitors: ground hogs, rabbits etc., so I can’t plant certain veggies directly into the ground). I put the bucket in an area that receives a lot of sun and that’s it! From there it was just waiting and watching, keeping it properly moistened.

It took about 4-5 months for them to mature and here I am today, pulling out red potatoes! The leaves that sprouted were green and vibrant. Now they started to die back, so that prompted me to start checking to see if they’re ready. The first harvest provided more than enough for my Hubby and I have as a side for dinner. Today’s second harvest, has provided enough for us to have as hash browns for breakfast! Above you’ll see a picture of the onions that I harvested to make the hash browns. You can’t make tasty hash browns without onions right? There are more red potatoes in the bucket that are at different growth stages, even brand-new babies, so I’ll just keep adding in more scraps and pulling out mature ones until the frost comes.

For flavor, I cut some fresh herbs to go in my hash browns. I’m pretty simple when it comes to food. The less I have to add to it and the more my body can get back from it, the better! So all that I’m adding into my hash browns, aside from these five herbs, is a little black pepper, pink Himalayan salt! Below you’ll find continued images of my harvesting journey with red potatoes and my simple, one skillet whip up of hash browns and brown eggs for breakfast. I hope you enjoy!

This was my first attempt at growing using this method and I’m just so excited to learn and work my way through this process. It’s also great to see for myself that I really can grow food this way. It was such an awesome experience. I figured I would capture some images and video along the way and share it with the world via my first blog post! I’ve wanted to blog about my adventures in my Backyard Oasis for a long time and have finally figured out a workflow that fits in with my daily schedule and I can make that happen.

If you’ve made it this far, then you’ve officially read my first blog post and I THANK YOU!! I’ve already started the same process with white and russet potatoes and I’m getting ready to start again with some sweet potatoes that have been sprouting buds in my kitchen window. I can’t wait to share more so I hope you won’t be a stranger and come back again. Thanks a lot for visiting!