In the year 1531, the Spanish military commander, Fransisco Pizarro, landed with a force on the shore of what is now Peru. His intent was to subdue the native people, the Incas, for the purpose of stealing their gold and silver. He was following up on the exploits of Hernan Cortez a dozen years earlier, whose insatiable appetite for gold had destroyed the Aztecs in Mexico
And, as in the case of Cortez, who was responsible for unwittingly introducing Europe to, (among other things) corn, tomatoes, chilie peppers and chocolate, Pizarro discovered the potato for the world he left behind while bringing fresh, new diseases to the natives. The Andean people had been cultivating hundreds of varieties of this remarkable plant for thousands of years before the Incas, before Pizarro, even before there was such a thing as Peru.
The Spaniards saw that it was an excellent source of nutrition for the native people and that it could travel without spoiling and keep their soldiers fed. Subsequently, these Spanish explorers brought it back across the Atlantic, where it ultimately fed the people of Europe, keeping many from starvation.
That process began around 1562, some 30 years after potatoes had been “discovered” by the Spanish and had been grown for several years in the Canary Islands. They were not welcomed on the mainland because nobody had ever seen any potatoes before and a lot of people thought they were poison and, because they were all knotted and gnarly, could cause leprosy. Some in the clergy even said they were from the devil because they were not mentioned anywhere in the Bible. (Well, duh!)
Fortunately for us, the potato quickly lost its bad reputation and not only rescued thousands of Europeans from famine in the 16th and 17th Centuries but became a very popular staple almost everywhere in the world.
Maybe the most famous potato in the world today is the Idaho Potato. It’s just a normal Russet potato but the reason it’s named the Idaho Potato is because it’s grown a lot in Idaho. That’s it. The State of Idaho got to be named “Idaho” because people liked the way the name sounded. But the word “Idaho” was simply made up. Nobody knows what it means. As far as anyone knows, it doesn’t actually mean anything. It isn’t a Native American word but it does have a catchy sound when spoken I guess. They have an Idaho Potato Museum in Blackfoot, Idaho, between Idaho Falls and Pocatello,Idaho. Who knew? Maybe Ida.
One of my favorite things to make with potatoes is a very simple but tasty potato salad.
You Can Do This
Place 4 tennis ball-sized red potatoes, skins on and 4 eggs in-shell into a medium pot and cover with water. (Don’t use Idaho potatoes).
With the heat turned to medium, slowly bring this to a boil and turn the heat down to medium-low.
After 10 minutes, remove the eggs and set aside in cold water.
Let the potatoes boil gently and slowly for another 15 minutes.
Remove the potatoes and allow them to cool (at room temp).
When the potatoes are cool enough to handle, cut them into dice-sized cubes and put them into a bowl. I leave the skins on but peel away if you like.
Peel the eggs and chop them up then put them in the bowl with the potatoes.
Add 1/2 cup mayonnaise.
Add a spoonful of celery seed.
Add a heaping tablespoon of sweet pickle relish.
Mix all this until just coated then place, covered, in the refrigerator to ripen and cool.
Garnish with a tap or two of paprika.
Among the potatoes the Spaniards discovered in South America was what Native tribes people called the “batata” or the sweet potato. Obviously, our word “potato” derives from this. Sweet potatoes are a year-round favorite in the United States nowadays, especially around Thanksgiving and Christmas. They were a frequent feature on the dinner table at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, topped with a candy-like substance derived from plants called “mallow” which grew around coastal marshes —- hence “marsh-mallow”.
This is very easy to make if you have a microwave. Just put a couple of nice-sized sweet potatoes (yams) in and run on high for about 10 or 12 minutes then allow to cool enough to be handled. Peel and smash them up pretty good with as much butter as you can stand, sprinkle some cinnamon over this, put it in a casserole dish and top with some marshmallows. Put the dish back in the microwave and run on high for 3-4 minutes so that the marshmallows melt. That’s it.
The potato saved Ireland and France by almost doubling the amount of protein you could produce on a single acre. But then, starting in 1845, the potatoes inexplicably began to rot in the fields and farmers could no longer reap enough from the harvest to keep their families alive. It was the Great Hunger or the Great Potato Famine.
Well over 1 million people died in Ireland as a result and a million and a half more left the country hoping to survive in America. We now know that the cause of the famine was that potatoes were planted not with new stock each year but with cuttings of existing potatoes which caused potatoes to become progressively less resistant to disease. The result produced annual crops of clones which succumbed to the blight.
An Amazing Story
Halfway into this terrible famine, a group of Choctaw Indians in Oklahoma collected $710 and sent it to help the people of Ireland who were starving. Many of those Indians were themselves living in or near poverty and it was a significant sacrifice for them to do this.
In 1997, Irish President Mary Robinson publically commemorated this amazing gift on its 150th anniversary.
Indian givers!
(PS: By the way, russet is a color and the Russet Burbank potato was identified in 1914 by Lou Sweet, a grower in western Colorado. The Russet Burbank became and still is the major cultivar grown in the USA especially in the Pacific Northwest (Idaho). Its two major uses are for making French fries and use as a baking potato.)