mashua, yacon, oca: growing edible andean tubers, with help from peace seedlings

HER PLANT-BREEDER FATHER, Dr. Alan Kapuler, has been turning me and other gardeners on to unexpected edibles for decades, but today it’s Dylana Kapuler who’s coaching me patiently, this time about Andean tubers with names like yacon, mashua and oca (above) that are making their way around the world and into gardens. They’re nutritious, prolific and just plain fascinating—and now you can try them.

The pre-Columbian Indians of the Andes domesticated more starchy root crops than any other culture, but only the potato caught on as a staple worldwide.

“The others have seldom been tried outside South America, yet they are still found in the Andes and represent some of the most interesting of all root crops.…” said a 1989 report called “Lost Crops of the Incas: Little-Known Plants of the Andes with Promise for Worldwide Cultivation” from the National Research Council.

“They come in myriad colors, shapes, and sizes,” the report added. “They belong to botanical families as different as those of mustard, legumes, and sunflower. They tend to be richer in vitamins and proteins than today’s conventional roots. And collectively, they show enormous adaptability to difficult conditions.”

All of that is what attracted Dr. Alan Kapuler to them, and gradually the longtime family farm and seed company in Corvallis, Oregon, now called Peace Seedlings and run by Dylana Kapuler and Mario DiBenedetto, has built up stock.

Full instructions come with each shipment of starts, but here are some basics:

yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolius)

A relative of dahlias and Jerusalem artichokes, yacon forms large, edible tubers, above, with russet skins and a unique characteristic—or should I say lack of a characteristic: They have no eyes (the growth points we are

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