"MW" wrote
What exactly are sweet potato slips?

Rooted cuttings basically.
What I did was sit the sweet potato in a box with a thin layer of potting
compost on the bottom ( about 2.5cm) and place it somewhere light and
warmish (say 60°F) and they will sprout and then root. These are simply
pulled off the potatoes and potted on, the potatoes will then make more
slips.


And can you use supermarket bought sweet potatoes (once 'slipped') to
plant out to grown your own, rather than buying slips from seed
suppliers.

You can but they will be foreign grown ones and therefore not that suitable
for the UK with our short naff summers.
Even growing on my own slips early from small potatoes grown from bought
slips the previous year we still didn't get a usable crop. In this country
they need a good long sunny summer and plenty of water. BTW they are also
very susceptible to slug damage so if your normal spuds get problems with
slugs you won't get much of a sweet potato crop left even if you get that
far.
Perhaps in a big polytunnel they would be worthwhile.

--
Regards
Bob Hobden
W.of London. UK