Potatoes Periodic Table

The Periodic Table of… Potatoes?

I’m Czechoslovakian but I joke that my family is Irish--we rely heavily on potatoes, whether they be mashed, fried, casserole-d, scalloped, or in my soup. Americans discuss potatoes like they’re native to countries like Ireland and states like Idaho, hence my wisecrack one-liner. However, potatoes have a longer, more complicated history than Idaho’s Potato Museum or the Irish Potato Famine. The Incas first cultivated potatoes around 8,000 to 5,000 B.C.--they held the sole key to the thousands of cultivars of potatoes until Spanish Conquistadors invaded Peru in 1536, claimed ownership of the potato, and dispersed them all over Europe in a prolific monoculture. This perennial tuber, Solanum tuberosum, now takes

When she prepared the potatoes, she always saved me one whole potato from the burlap bag of twenty. I played with it, analyzing its curves and incongruities, its bruises and crooks. It sighed with heaviness in my weak, child-like hands. I rubbed it against my smooth arms, giggling at the tickly sensations of the outer layers that shielded the starchy insides against bugs and germs in the soil. It felt tough and wrinkled like my grandma’s skin. Sometimes when the potatoes sat a while in her home, they grew small sprouts from their eyes. A chemical reaction photosynthesized a shoot--I knew they were secretly alive. I drew faces on them, circling the eyes and connecting the dots to create a mouth. This way, as I scrutinized them, they could scrutinize me back. My childhood experiences with the periodic table of potatoes transfigured into a macro-obsession with all things potato, including potato

When I was a child, I liked smiley face french fries or curly fries. My elementary school handed out McDonald’s french fry vouchers as a reward for completing our summer reading. I dip my fries in ketchup and ranch dressing, and recently ate an inventive falafel wrap that contained french fries as a condiment. Although french fries aren’t healthy for us, we must admit that they spin around us on billboards, commercials, menus, and minds, playing a substantial role in our culture. We’ve eaten french fries since the early 19th century. Legend upholds that Collinet, King Louis Phillipe’s chef, discovered french fries when he unintentionally plunged already fried potatoes into hot oil to reheat them for the King’s reheated dinner. They puffed up like little potato balloons, crisp with hydrogenated oil. French fries next arrived in the U.S. when Thomas Jefferson served them as part of the latest fashion. Then, Chef George Crum invented chips in an act of spite. He sliced potatoes paper thin to anger Cornelius Vanderbilt who complained of thick potatoes, then fried them in hot oil, and salted and served them. Vanderbilt loved his “Saratoga Crunch Chips,” sparking the beginnings of the potato chip industry. Potatoes are what you make of