# soft sprouted potatoes



## PioneerWoman

I had half bag of potatoes and it is a little soft and starting to sprout. Is it still safe to use ?


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## beaglebiz

yes..


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## whodunit

I've heard the sprouts are not good for you (maybe poisonous), so you might want to cut them off before cooking and eating.


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## culpeper

Emphatically *NO*! Those sprouts are poisonous, and the poison will have spread throughout the potato itself. No amount of cooking will remove that poison. 

You might survive eating them, but on the other hand you might not. It depends on just how much of the poisons you ingest. Why take the risk, and especially why feed them to your vulnerable children (if you have any)? 

You have to be very, very careful with potatoes. Here's a list of some of the components of a potato - the nasty ones increase dramatically in quantity and potency when a potato is green, or is sprouting._ There is absolutely NO POINT in removing the green bits or the sprouts - in fact, keeping the rest is more dangerous than eating the bits you've removed!_

potassium, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, sulphur, iron, copper, manganese, zinc, molybdenum, cobalt, nickel, chromium, fluorine, selenium, silicon, rubidium, aluminium, boron, bromine, mercury, arsenic, cadmium and lead. While some of these minerals are toxic in large amounts, they are essential in minute amounts to the human body.

Do yourself a favour and plant the sprouting potatoes instead - that way you'll be much safer, plus you'll get a whole lot of new potatoes before too long.


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## goatsareus

every spring we are eating the most be-dragled looking potatoes you can, or can not, imagine. They will be shriveled with sprouts over one foot long. I break off the long sprouts and discard them, then proceed to scrub the poor pitiful looking shriveled potatoes, and make mashed potatoes. And I'm here to talk about it


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## gone-a-milkin

I have never been sick from those potatoes either, nor have my vulnerable children.:shrug:


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## suitcase_sally

"Poison" is a very overused word.

Potato sprouts contain an alkaloid called "solanine" that, while poisonous, one would have to eat a very large amount of sprouts to become sick. As long as the potato is not green, just remove the sprouts and the potatoes are fine. If this were not true most people would be dead by now as most people remove the sprouts. In fact, I have never heard of anyone making "Potato Sprout Stir-fry".

Shriveled potatoes make good french fries because they have lost much of their moisture.


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## whodunit

Most store-bought potatoes have a chemical applied to them to prevent sprouting, so even eating the skins (which contain many nutrients) may not be healthy (even though I'll admit I frequently eat them).


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## okiemom

half the potatos I see at the store have green skin from sitting under the store lights. Peel the skins off and keep going.


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## snoozy

Let them sprout, cut them up and bury them in the garden. They are volunteers for a new potato crop, so just go with the flow.


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## NickieL

snoozy said:


> Let them sprout, cut them up and bury them in the garden. They are volunteers for a new potato crop, so just go with the flow.


I've done that and ended up with potato scab. Use certified disease free as its very difficult to get rid off.

As for the OP topic, I eat soft sprouted potatoes a lot. I don't have a good place to store spuds so they tend to sprout before I can use them up. Just remove the sprouts and scrub em good.


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