TikTok's Hack For Growing Potatoes From Scraps Is A Game Changer

Next time you have food scraps left over from cooking, think twice before throwing them in the trash or garbage disposal. Certain kitchen leftovers can safely attract birds to your garden, while other food scraps can be used to fertilize your garden. Potatoes are one of the easiest foods to regrow from scraps.

If your potatoes have ever been left long enough to start sprouting, you know exactly what the first step of this method looks like. Those sprouts grow from budding spots called "eyes," each of which has the potential to grow to form a new potato plant (and multiple new potatoes).

The process of growing potatoes from scraps has gone viral as a "hack" on TikTok, with users explaining how to prepare and plant those sprouted potatoes to reap many more future spuds. But this method isn't unique or new, as Tiffany Selvey, House Digest's Garden Editor and in-house Master Gardener, explains in an exclusive interview. It's the standard method for growing potatoes in farms and gardens across the world. It just so happens to be pretty easy to replicate at home.

As this viral TikTok explains, you can grow potatoes from scraps by cutting off each section of the potato that has grown eyes, and planting it in soil with the eyes facing up. It's best to let the cut pieces of potato scab over before planting so they're less vulnerable to disease. If the sprouts are already very long, just clip them down.

"This is how potatoes have been grown for ages," Tiffany Selvey exclusively tells House Digest. Rather than buying actual seeds, gardeners and farmers buy "seed potatoes," which are potatoes that are specifically sold to be planted in the ground to grow new plants. And before seed potatoes were commonly available at garden stores, Selvey says farmers just saved a few of their best ones for later planting: "They stored them in a cool, dry place so they wouldn't rot or sprout, then they would cut them into pieces to plant a new crop in the spring."

Like farmers used to, you can store leftover potatoes in a cool, dry spot until you're ready to prepare them for planting (when potatoes sprout in your kitchen, it means they're getting enough warmth and light to think it's growing time). Alternatively, if you can't wait that long, you can grow potatoes from scraps indoors; you may need a grow light to aid your efforts.

The best time to plant potatoes is two to four weeks before the last frost of the spring. The shoots will start to appear above the ground two to six weeks after planting, and you'll be eating fresh new potatoes after about 60 to 90 days of growth, or when the stems turn brown and start dying back, Selvey exclusively explains to House Digest.

TikTokers advise planting each cut piece 12 inches apart and 6 to 8 inches deep in the soil. Some recommend "hilling," or piling a thin layer of soil or compost around the plant a few times throughout the growing process. Selvey says your choice of method depends on your goals.

Hilling is the traditional way to grow potatoes because it results in a bigger harvest. "By adding more soil around the stem of the plant as it grows, you're forcing it to produce more roots. From those roots grow the tubers we enjoy so much," Selvey explains.

But "if you want to plant and forget your potatoes, you can dig a deep hole and add your cut potato," Selvey says. "It will grow and reach for the sun as it produces tubers. This is great for containers or anyone with limited space or time."