Potato Setanta – voted best roastie
Tasty red-skinned potato comes out on top
When certain employees at Thompson & Morgan received an internal email from Paul Hansord, managing director, asking them to meet him in the staff canteen, they were unsure of what to expect.
Surprised to be greeted by the distinctive and delicious smell of roasting potatoes, they took their seats for what they assumed was a meeting. But instead of an agenda, they were presented with a plate.
‘I really didn’t know what was going on,’ said Chloe Farmer, head of design. ‘I thought Paul wanted to discuss the Kitchen Garden catalogue.’
In fact, Paul Hansord had assembled a team of potato tasters to carry out ‘blind’ taste tests on 7 varieties of potatoes. He wanted to find out which variety made the best ‘roasties’.
Potato Setanta – voted best roastie
Over the next hour, the lucky seven staff members were treated to a potato feast. Not knowing the variety names, they were simply asked to rate each ‘roastie’ according to their taste, colour and crispness.
‘It was difficult to taste the difference between some of the roast potatoes’, commented Vicky Ager, T&M’s direct marketing manager. ‘But one of them really stood out – it was just so delicious!’.
All 7 taste panel members, including Colin Randel, vegetable product manager and a renowned authority on potatoes, agreed that one potato outclassed all the others when it came to that fabulous roast potato taste.
‘The golden crisp skins with that melt-in-the-mouth buttery flesh made my mind up straight away’, said Colin.
Thompson & Morgan’s potato tasting team
So it was Setanta that was the unanimous choice of the taste testers. Boasting famous variety ‘Rooster’ as one of its parent lines, Setanta produces a high yield of medium-sized, oval, red-skinned tubers with medium yellow flesh. It has the reputation of being relatively pest and disease-free, as well as drought tolerant, so will appeal to the home gardener as a hassle-free variety to grow.
‘Setanta wowed the T&M blind taste test with its perfect roastie taste …. It’s the only roast potato I’ll be growing this year!’ said Paul Hansord on announcing the winner.
Setanta is available to buy online, priced at £4.99 for 20 tubers and £8.99 for 40 tubers.
Rebecca works in the Marketing department as part of the busy web team, focusing on updating the UK news and blog pages and Thompson & Morgan’s international website. Rebecca enjoys gardening and learning about flowers and growing vegetables with her young daughter.