{"id":66,"date":"2023-03-14T19:53:47","date_gmt":"2023-03-14T19:53:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/?p=66"},"modified":"2023-03-14T19:53:48","modified_gmt":"2023-03-14T19:53:48","slug":"on-americas-favorite-food-potatoes-epictactical","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/?p=66","title":{"rendered":"ON AMERICA\u2019S FAVORITE FOOD: POTATOES \u2013 EpicTactical"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

By Christopher Nyerges. <\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0[Nyerges is the author of \u201cGuide to Wild Foods,\u201d \u201cUrban Survival Guide,\u201d \u201cHow to Survive Anywhere,\u201d and about two dozen other books. More information on his books and classes is found at www.SchoolofSelf-Reliance.com<\/a>]<\/i><\/p>\n

I love potatoes and the vast variety of flavors and textures that can be produced from them.<\/p>\n

In the potato mythology of my past, I think about a farmer in the fields in the fall, burning a pile of dry leaves, and baking a potato in the coals as smoke billows up this way and that.<\/p>\n

When I lived on my grandfather\u2019s farm in rural Ohio after high school, I\u00a0 would drive 26 miles each way to work, from Chardon to Middlefield, through the countryside, and would often see brush piles burning along the road, always wondering if there were a few potatoes being baked in the smouldering pile.<\/p>\n

When I finally did my own potato baking in coals, it was a bit messier than I expected, but still produced a delicious afternoon meal that was so wonderfully enhanced with just a bit of Amish butter.<\/p>\n

At home in the kitchen or in the backyard, or in the forest, I still love baking potatoes and its woodsy aromatic odor.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

GROWING YOUR OWN<\/p>\n

Eventually, I learned the ease with which I could grow my own potatoes.\u00a0 I first read up on it, and learned that you can cut out the sprouts of a sprouting potato and plant each of those in the garden.\u00a0 It sounded complicated, and being a lazy gardener, I planted the whole sprouted potatoes in various garden patches, including some raised beds.\u00a0 I just dug a hole, making sure it was good loamy soil, and planted the potato.<\/p>\n

The plant grows up and resembles a wild nightshade plant \u2013 of course, that\u2019s because potatoes are in the Nightshade Family.\u00a0 Then, in a few months when the plant has matured and faded, you can dig into the soil and presto! \u2013 each potato will have produced about a dozen new potatoes.\u00a0 I was really amazed that very first time to see many potatoes where I only planted one!<\/p>\n

I have never discarded sprouted potatoes ever since.\u00a0 I plant them in different spots, and I have at least one spot where I always leave a few in the ground, creating a semi-permanent, perennial patch of potatoes.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think you\u2019d want to live off potatoes entirely, but you\u2019d not starve if you had potatoes.\u00a0 They are a decent source of calories (between 70 and 90 calories per 100 grams of potatoes), not much fat, and between 15 to 20 grams of carbohydrate per 100 grams.\u00a0 The numbers, according to the USDA, vary due to the different ways that potatoes are processed (peels or no peels), and cooked.\u00a0 Each 100 grams of potatoes contains about 300 to 500 mg. of potassium, about 15 to 20 mg. of Vitamin C, 40 to 65 mg. of phosphorus, and trace amounts of many more vitamins and minerals. And you know how we all eat potatoes\u2014no one eats them plain! By the time you\u2019ve added diced onions, and maybe some garlic, and cheese, and butter, you have a pretty satisfactory meal!<\/p>\n

My brother was a fanatic lover of\u00a0 \u201cFrench fries\u201d when we were growing up, something I never understood. He always ordered a side of French fries when he ordered a burger from the local burger joint. He seemed to relish them immensely, dipping each deep-fried potato stick into gobs of ketchup before consuming it.\u00a0 For whatever reason, I never developed a liking for French fries, and find this to be the least desirable way to eat the honorable potato.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Today, the potato (Solanum tuberosum) is considered one of the most important food plants of the world.<\/p>\n

The \u201cEuropean\u201d or \u201cIrish\u201d potato is believed to have descended from the plants which originated in the temperate Andes of South America, where it is believed that they have been grown and eaten for at least 2000 years.<\/p>\n

It was most likely introduced into Europe via Spain, in the late 1500s.\u00a0\u00a0 These early potatoes were longer than wide, and knobby, much like the \u201cfingerling\u201d potatoes gaining in popularity today.<\/p>\n

Potatoes are perennials, which \u2013 under the right conditions \u2013 yield a higher food value per acre than any cereal. \u00a0Their chief commercial disadvantage when compared to cereals (grasses) are the high water content (which adds to the cost of transportation), and the shorter storage-life.<\/p>\n

(By comparison, cereal grains can be stored for hundreds, if not thousands, of years).<\/p>\n

Perhaps my favorite way to cook potatoes was taught to me by Tree and Water expert Timothy Hall, who would often prepare potatoes during our meal times at the non-profit of which we were both members.<\/p>\n

Hall first sliced the potatoes into pieces about \u00bc inch thick, but more often he\u2019d simply cut the potato lengthwise into four large pieces.\u00a0 He\u2019d slowly simmer these in olive oil in a large cast iron skillet until done, and then sprinkle some garlic or pepper over them. These were awesome!<\/p>\n

I love potatoes! I like the Timothy Hall-style, boiled, baked, in salad, and potato chips.\u00a0 How can anyone not like potato chips?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Christopher Nyerges. \u00a0[Nyerges is the author of \u201cGuide to Wild Foods,\u201d \u201cUrban Survival Guide,\u201d \u201cHow to Survive Anywhere,\u201d and about two dozen other books. More information on his books and classes is found at www.SchoolofSelf-Reliance.com] I love potatoes and the vast variety of flavors and textures that can be produced from them. In the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":67,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-survival"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=66"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":68,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66\/revisions\/68"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/67"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=66"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=66"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/knifevoyager.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=66"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}