Potato, German Butterball

German Butterball is a very common and popular variety.  It has light yellow skin and flesh, uniform tubers, and a medium average tuber size.  I think it is one of the better flavored heirloom varieties and it seems to have fairly good tolerance for many of the common potato diseases.

Because this potato is widely available, I generally don’t offer tubers.  You can find certified tubers of this variety at the major seed potato suppliers for a better price than I could offer.  I do sometimes offer true seed of this variety.

Culinary Traits

I am rarely impressed by the European heirloom varieties, finding them often fairly bland, but German Butterball is a very good potato.  It has an all purpose texture, suitable for baking, boiling, or frying.  If you like “Yukon Gold” type potatoes, you ought to like German Butterball.

Agronomic Traits

German Butterball is a late season potato with medium size plants.  Yields can be very good when soil moisture is maintained at even levels throughout the growing season.  Tubers are uniform and reach five to six inches.  This is a fairly reliable flowerer and it is able to self-pollinate, so true seeds are fairly easy to obtain.  Disease tolerance seems pretty good in this variety and it does not suffer too badly with our usual suspects: early blight and potato virus Y.

True Seed (TPS)

True seed of this variety was open pollinated and it grew in a block with other yellow varieties.  From experience, I expect mostly yellows and whites and there should be a smaller number of other colors from outcrossing as well.