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[roadrunnertwice]

Via the fictional cvillette comes a true but strange story about spuds. And apparently this is the International Year of the Potato?! Thanks, United Nations -- I know what I'm having for breakfast tomorrow!

All the talk about nutritional value in that article reminds me of something I heard while I was in Cork. See, there was a good long stretch between the introduction of taters and the Famine during which the Irish were basically living on potatoes and milk, which doesn't sound like a particularly healthy diet. But it turns out that the British military kept pretty decent records on the soldiers it conscripted, and if you go back and look at these, the Irish soldiers were in consistently better health upon conscription than their English counterparts. So while a taters-and-milk diet may kind of suck, it's apparently better than anything else an impoverished 19th-century wretch can afford -- I guess they really ARE more than just starch.

Comments

[gyladia.livejournal.com]

So I read that, and then I looked up the famine, and all in all I still think potatoes are pretty scary. Or reliance on them at least.

My Great-great Grandparents crossed the ocean some 37 years after the Famine, and I always wondered why they didn't just stay since at least some of their families must have lived through it and still been there. And I read this book once about a family who moved into a cottage that was haunted because the dead famine victims were thrown into a pit out back- Still alive! I think. It was a long time ago and I can't even remember what it was called.

Also, I wonder at how hard it would be to actually get enough countries to grow enough potatoes to feed the world. I've read things about the failures of the Green Revolution in Bali with rice fields and I'm not convinced outsider attempts at fixing things are always the best ways to deal with things. I think the best point the article made was about changing peoples eating habits. There are a lot of bad habits people pick up when things are cheap and eating more wheat is probably just one of the smaller ones. Having a million kids is probably another.

[roadrunnertwice]

Yeah, I consider the Famine to have been our global "Don't ever do that monoculture thing" wake-up call. Nasty business.

I think the big attraction of the potato right now is that, seeing as how it grows anyplace that isn't currently on fire, it makes for good locally-produced calories. I read the article as being less about getting China or Afghanistan to "feed the world" and more about getting everyone else to feed the neighborhood. Which seems like a good idea to me, as long as people can refrain from being insane about it. (Famous last words.)

[itastelikelove.livejournal.com]

I didn't read the whole article, but I did just go and make myself some potato soup...I was going to anyway, but it was much more fun after seeing that. :)

[roadrunnertwice]

Yeah, I was going to be frying those potatoes* this morning regardless, but there was a definite extra savor added.

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* With mushrooms, red pepper, herbes de provence, and tomatillo slices. And a scrambled egg.