It’s potato season, people (although, let’s be honest, all seasons are potato seasons). Potatoes fit easily into lots of dishes, like salads, cozy soups, and big holiday meals. They’re also pretty easy to keep stocked. Unlike more fragile produce, potatoes can be stored for weeks without spoiling … if you do it correctly.
After a recent disappointing encounter with some prematurely rotten potatoes, I went looking for a longer-term storage solution than what I had been doing (leaving them in the bag on my kitchen island), and found a solution that required basically zero effort: the humble cardboard box.
Why You Should Store Potatoes in a Cardboard Box
Like onions and apples, potatoes lend themselves very well to long-term storage. Potatoes are ideally stored in a cool, dark place (much like myself — just kidding) where they can last for weeks or even months. Potatoes are best kept away from direct sunlight, so a pantry or cabinet with a closed door (read: the opposite of the top of the kitchen island, oops!) is a great place for them. It turns out, though, that you can extend their life even more by transferring them out of their original packaging and placing them in a cardboard box.
This simple storage swap can make a huge difference. In our storage showdown, we found that potatoes stored in a cardboard box fared better than those stored in a bowl, a basket, and a plastic or paper bag. They had the fewest sprouts and remained snappy, moist, and firm to the touch. When cooked, they retained their flavor the best as well. So if, like me, you’re planning to keep potatoes stocked constantly well into the colder months, then you should grab a box for them. I promise you’ll be glad you did when you’re craving your favorite potato recipe and those spuds you bought weeks ago are looking just as good as they did the day you brought them home.