This time of year, I’m always pairing what remains of last season’s harvest with the first of spring’s perennial edibles. As they push through the ground and show off their bright green tops, I can’t help but snip a handful at a time onto whatever I’m trying to use up from dry storage or the freezer.

That approach to homegrown produce applies to this week’s Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon. In my unheated mudroom, the last of the potatoes that we dug and cured in October have begun to sprout in their storage box, an old, lidless cooler with a few shims in the bottom to allow air circulation and a towel thrown over the top to keep the light out and the potatoes from turning green. They’re still firm and ideal for mashed potatoes. The final garlic heads and onion bulbs are also trying to sprout but haven’t softened. All it takes is a sprinkling of the emerging onion tops cut from perennial walking onions to make the storage vegetables worthy of a spring meal.

Learn more about flavoring mashed potatoes and get the complete recipe for Bagna Cauda-Style Mashed Potatoes in my column.

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Twice As Tasty

We grow long rows with several varieties of potatoes that appear in many of my recipes, whether as a base for salad or soup or as a featured ingredient in frittata or at breakfast. They’re really a blank canvas for so many flavors. When I mash homegrown potatoes or store-bought sweet potatoes, which are delicious but dislike northwest Montana’s short season, I might put a mellow, creamy spin on them by using coconut milk or a tangy one by adding vinegar.

Through some of my work for Taste of Home, I’ve expanded my standard and sweet potato repertoire. These pieces have been going live over the last few months, so I’m excited to finally share them here.

• Potato Dumplings
• Homemade Tater Tots
• Sweet Potato Pecan Pie
• Sweet Potato Cake

You can find more recipes that use potatoes and sweet potatoes in the recipe index.

Potato recipes often lead to a sink full of oversized dishes that need to be handwashed even if your kitchen has an automatic dishwasher. I recently wrote a piece for Allrecipes that reviews the best dish drying racks—and explains why you should use one instead of just laying out a towel. Learn more in this article. Read more of my work off the blog here.

Want more Twice as Tasty recipes? Get my books! Click here to order a personally signed, packaged, and shipped copy of The Complete Guide to Pickling directly from me. I also share tasty ways to use pickles in The Pickled Picnic; it’s only available here.