(10/5) Readers of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy may remember an exchange between Gollum and Samwise Gamgee, Frodo’s trusted companion and gardener. Gollum asks, "What’s taters, Precious? What’s taters, eh?" Sam, apparently surprised that Gollum doesn’t know, answers, "Po-Tay-Toes! Boil ‘em, mash ‘em stick ‘em in a stew!" Afterall, for common peasant folk like hobbits, potatoes would be an important part of their diet, as they were just a century ago for us.

Today, the lowly spud is the fifth most important crop worldwide after wheat, corn, rice and sugarcane. Its history is important, too, especially in Europe. The original plant that we now know as Potato, Solanum tuberosum, was first grown in the Andes, where it is still an important food for the people living there.

The Spanish conquistadors brought the curious tubers grown by the Incas to Spain in the 1500s, where they long remained . . . well, a curiosity. They were cultivated on the Canary Islands and seafarers took tubers from there to Ireland, England, France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Peasants understood the virtues of this food crop more quickly than the aristocracy.

Up to this time, European peasants grew mainly grains which could be a precarious crop on which to rely. Grains grow with a head of edible seeds. If the seeds were too heavy, the stem was too weak, or heavy winds or rain blew down these grasses, the seed head flopped to the ground. This made cutting them with a scythe difficult, often leaving them behind, trampled and rotting. Fields frequently needed to be left fallow for a year to rebuild soil fertility.

Also, between 1550 and 1850, several famines occurred leaving the farmer with no harvest at the end of a year’s work, and no seed the following year. To make matters worse, conflicts between nations meant marauding armies could unexpectedly appear and burn or steal the grain crop.

Peasants saw that potatoes had lots of advantages. First, the potato’s yield was beneath the soil, and the tubers kept growing as long as the plant’s stems and leaves maintained them. It did not take a lot of land to yield enough to feed themselves and have tubers to plant the following year.

As the diet of the farming class shifted more toward potatoes, they became healthier. Potatoes have a high nutritional value with significant amounts of vitamin C and B6, potassium and manganese, as well as some protein and significant amounts of starch, the carbohydrate that powered the hard-working peasants.

Since the peasant population was often caught in the middle of violent political upheavals, potatoes had another feature that helped spare the crop. Growing underground, a marauding army couldn’t see the valuable part of the crop, and burning a field may have diminished the yield but it didn’t eliminate it entirely.

The aristocracy was not as astute as the peasants and it took some time before potatoes took on value as a culinary delight and a staple to feed their populations, particularly their armies. The French seemed particularly slow to catch on.

During the Seven Years War, Antoine-Augustin Parmentier spent time as a Prussian prisoner of war, forcing him to eat a diet consisting largely of potatoes. Imagine his disgust as he was expected to eat what the French considered hog food. Imagine his dismay when he became healthier on this fare. Once Parmentier returned to Paris, he began promoting potatoes as healthy and fit for human consumption.

It still took a lot to convince the French aristocrats to put potatoes on their dinner plate. Parmentier tried different schemes, including adding potatoes to the food given to patients of dysentery, making them stronger (1773) and holding grand dinner parties, one of which included Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson is said to have introduced French fries to the American colonies on returning to Virginia.

Potato cultivation in Europe is seen by Charles C. Mann ("How the Potato Changed the World," Smithsonian Magazine, November 2011) as the beginning of industrial farming. It became possible by the mid 1800s to cultivate large fields of potato, using plows and a new source of fertilizer – guano from islands in the Peruvian Pacific Ocean.

Unfortunately, there was one problem – all the potatoes grown in Europe were from just a few germ lines. Potatoes are grown from ‘seed potatoes’ or clones. A piece of potato the size of a small egg and having a couple of eyes (sprouts) grows a new plant. Each plant is genetically identical to its parent plant. Some breeding took place since their arrival in Europe, but the primary goals involved taste, storage and larger yields. Thus, monocropping genetically similar potatoes led one infectious pathogen, Phytophthora infestans, Late Blight, to infect most of Europe’s potato crop between 1845 – 1852, causing a devastating and long-lasting famine.

Just when European farmers were beginning to get over late blight, along comes an insect invader from North America – the Colorado Potato Beetle. This foliage-devouring insect that was ravaging potatoes in the US Missouri River Valley in the 1860s, hopped on a ship and made its way to Europe. The story goes that a frustrated farmer threw left over green paint on his potatoes, ridding them of the beetle.

The green pigment in the paint was Paris green, which gets its color from copper and arsenic. It turned out to be effective against both the beetle and late blight. Chemists quickly started trying other combinations of metal compounds to determine their effectiveness against other pests and diseases. Thus began the modern pesticide industry. Monocropping, bagged fertilizers, and chemical pesticides ‘factory farming’ transformed agriculture, leading to the Green Revolution that followed World War II.

While the human side of the history of potato cultivation is interesting, we would like to know how to grow them today in our home gardens. It isn’t really difficult, but that’s a story for next week. In the meantime, Bon Appetit!

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Potatoes from the Home Garden to the Dinner Plate

Spuds. Taters. Tubers. Whatever you call potatoes, they are a humble food that can lift the spirit on a cold night. They aren’t bad in a summer salad, either. Or stolen from beneath the flowering foliage and oiled, seasoned and roasted.

Besides being nutritious, filling, and accommodating the chef’s imagination, they are easy for the home gardener to grow. Does it seem silly when they are readily available and inexpensive? Let me ask you if you ever had home grown potatoes? Whether it is a common Russett or a more exotic Adirondack Blue, potatoes from the fertile soil of your home garden beats the grocery store version every time.

Potatoes aren’t hard to grow. They have a few requirements, but none which makes growing them difficult. The potato plant itself and how it grows tells you a lot. It starts as a firm "seed potato," that is, a small potato or a piece of potato the size of an egg. Each seed potato should have at least two eyes. It is set out in the light a few days before planting; this is called "green sprouting," and it helps the potato get a head start. If you are planting a potato piece into moisture-holding clay soil, a dusting of lime or sulfur on the cut edge reduces the chance of rot.

Lots of folklore surrounds the timing of potato planting, but the best time is when the soil is ready. The soil should consistently be about 50oF in the morning and the evenings should be frost free. The foliage cannot handle frost, so avoid planting while there is danger of frost.

The tubers grow on underground stems; planting them deeply in wide rows allows them to spread out. Soil pH should be slightly acidic, pH 6.0 - 6.5, lower if there is disease present. While potatoes aren’t heavy nitrogen feeders, they like potassium, phosphorus and calcium. An organic fertilizer of ground fish meal is ideal, but any slow-release organic fertilizer works.

I prepare a long bed about 3-ft in width with the necessary soil nutrients and pH amendments. Then I dig a trench that will be about 8-10 inches deep and place a couple of inches of composted organic matter in it to loosen the clay. Cover with soil so the trench is 4-5 inches deep and thoroughly mix the organic material and soil. Smooth it out. Place one seed potato every 12 inches and cover with 3 inches of soil.

The eyes on the seed potato are the sprouts that will give rise to the stems. The stems emerge from the ground but beneath the soil there are side shoots, called stolons. The potatoes form on these stolons/side shoots not long after the stem emerges from the soil.

A tip to increase your harvest is to ‘hill up’ the soil, covering more of the stem and allowing the stem to elongate and produce more stolons, and more potatoes. I do this once or twice. About a month after the stems first emerge I stop hilling and cover the hills with a mulch. Any tuber that develops close to the soil surface will get sun scald, that is, it will turn green. Keep them covered with soil and mulch.

Marigolds make good companion plants for potatoes to deter nematodes. Other pests that might come to your feast are Colorado Potato Beetles and aphids. Aphids haven’t been a problem for me since I’ve kept flowers nearby to attract beneficial predators. The potato beetles need to be hand-picked and if caught early they do not become a problem.

Water and hand weed while the foliage is actively growing. It’s a good time to be looking for pests, too. Flowers appear beginning in early July for the earliest varieties and it’s a signal that potato development is well underway beneath the soil surface. After the flowers are finished, reduce watering to once a week if it doesn’t rain. A few weeks after the flowers die back, the potatoes are nearly ready if you are planning on storing them.

"New potatoes" are potatoes that have not been in the ground long enough to toughen their skins. If you stick your hand into the soil beneath the stem, you can grab a few for dinner. They are a delicacy, tender and having a slightly higher moisture content than those left in the ground to toughen.

Leave the potatoes destined for storage in the ground for another month or so. Remove them earlier if heavy rain or a freeze is forecasted. Wash off excessive soil but don’t thoroughly clean them until you are ready to use them. Store them in a dark, humid area about 38oF. Root cellars are great. Garages shift between warm and cold several times in our winters and the frequent temperature changes signal the potatoes to start sprouting. Light can cause the potato to produce solanine, a bitter green, toxic substance. (It’s okay to cut the green part out and eat the rest of the tuber.)

You may be tempted to save some of your tubers to plant the following year. This is how potato cultivation occurred for centuries and allowed their movement around the globe, but it isn’t recommended. If your soil has any fungal diseases, planting stored seed potatoes may spread the pathogens.

What variety should you plant? I like planting three varieties – two favorites and something new. Read your potato seed catalog and determine what you like. I look for features like size of plant (large plants need more room), yield (the more the better), eating quality (yum!), and late blight resistance. You probably have your own priorities.