P o t a t o
Potatoes are life savers, aren’t they? If you are hungry and there are potatoes in the kitchen, they won’t be there for long! Potatoes have this superpower through which they can turn into french fries and no matter how stuffed you are, there is always room for them. And when samosas meet potatoes, you just can’t not eat them! Oh and don’t even get me started on aloo ke parathay.
Bottom line: potatoes are winners, big time. But it hasn’t always been this way. Before the times when steaks could not even be imagined without a potato-based side order, people did not use to think very highly of potatoes. Potatoes were basically native to modern day Peru where the Ancient Incans had started to cultivate the crop 8000 years ago. Following Columbus’s voyages to America in late 15th Century, potatoes were among the things brought back to Europe. There, however, the “dull, tasteless oddity from a strange new land” was not particularly enjoyed and hence today’s staple food was rejected by the Europeans. But let’s not judge them, since potato plant did look like the toxic Belladonna plant (also known as deadly nightshade). A use was still found for the new plant though: decoration.
But that was just the beginning. This time can be called as the unattractive appearance of the potato before it is peeled, chopped, fried and frenched; and we all know the result. Within 200 years, potato became a major food source all over Europe. The nobles, however, still thought that the tuber belonged in peasant huts. Around 1750, the wide availability of the potato in European markets gave the lower classes food security during the incessant grain famines of those times. This is one main reason why the British, Dutch and German empires found strength in the increasing population of farmers, labourers and soldiers.
When Ireland started cultivating potatoes in 1590s, the population of the island dramatically grew from 1 million to 8 million in 1845. But the dependence on potato as a major food source turned out to be harmful when from 1845 to 1852 majority of the country’s crop was destroyed by potato blight disease. This resulted in the Irish Potato Famine that caused more than a million deaths due to starvation. After the recovery of the crop, Europe’s working class population kept growing and so did the cultivation of potato. The two million Irish citizens who migrated during the Famine to other European countries were now helping their new nations with the growing industrial revolution that required healthy and capable labourers. Even during the Second World War, the Allied troops were fed through the easy-to-grow crop. So no matter how bleak a future the Europeans thought the spud had, it turned out to be a major factor in shaping the modern world the way it is.
So how did the potato get its name? When Columbus and squad arrived at the Caribbean islands, a local Carib language called the sweet potatoes batata. With time, the name was extended to common potato from Peru. By 1530s, potatoes were being used as cheap food for Spanish sailors. In French, the word for potato is pomme de terre which literally means “earth-apple”.
Oh and sorry for the long post; here’s a potato.