Consider the potato. Not just as knobby protrusions from the sack that is part of your end-of-the-world lockdown pantry.
Consider the potato as a chameleon. It is an ingredient so plain that it takes on the flavours of whatever it is added to. It is also versatile enough to be reinterpreted for every meal of the day in a different form.
Consider the potato as a salve for hunger. This is the staple that miraculously extends a frugal meal. Cutting across the class and caste divide in India, a simple boiled potato becomes the staple that provides sustenance for those who can afford little else.
Consider the universality of the potato. A successful potato crop can feed a nation. Its failure on the hand, can cause starvation on a mass scale. The terrible Irish Potato Famine of 1845 killed off thousands and changed the country’s demographic forever.
Consider the potato as a quantum tuber. Space spuds were grown by NASA and China and tested aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia as early as 1995, making it the first vegetable to be grown outside Earth.
The potato has travelled thousands of miles across land and sea and outer space to become our daily tuber. Here is its brief history.
The potato then
The potato was indigenous to Peru till the 16th century and unknown elsewhere.
The voyages of Christopher Columbus opened up different parts of the world and its produce creating what was known as the Columbian Exchange. This allowed the potato to travel from its place of origin, across the seas to nearly every continent in the world. Easy to grow, resilient to vagaries of weather and abundant in their fruition, potatoes quickly became an answer to food shortages and a staple across Europe. Some historians have even argued that the potato spurred the rise of the West by ending famines and feeding rapidly growing populations.
Thereafter, the potato’s history and travels were contiguous with that of trade, expansionism and colonialism. From Europe to Africa and Asia, the potato arrived by sea and soon took root in the lands acquiring the character of the soil and varied cultivation methods.
In India, the story of the potato is one that begins with the early Portuguese and Dutch traders. However, their influence or reach did not extend across the subcontinent and the potato remained restricted to small patches along the Malabar coastline.
It was in the 18th Century, under the British East India Company that the potato got new impetus. The push didn’t come with an entirely noble agenda and was part of the British “civilizing” mission. The idea was to replace local vegetable varieties with more superior plants. Back then the potato was quite a novelty even in England and the British company agents wanted to continue their culinary explorations of this newfound item even in foreign lands. Since theirs was a long term mission in India, growing potatoes made far more sense than importing them. So, the plants were given out to farmers at a pittance and the overall agenda was one of indulgence as well as commerce for the potato business was picking up across the world.
By the 19th Century, potatoes were being grown all across Bengal and the hills of north India.
Colleen Taylor Sen in her piece titled ‘The Portuguese Influence on Bengali Cuisine” in her piece in Food on the Move: Proceedings of the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery lists the potato as one of the New World ingredients that transformed Bengali cuisine.
While the British presumed that the potato’s success would rival that of rice, instead, it was readily accepted and adapted into India’s diverse culinary lexicon. Food historian and writer Chitrita Banerji writes about dishes across the country that melded with the potato. Notable examples of this were the mochar ghonto (banana blossom stir fry) in Bengal which adopted diced potato into its preparation. Similarly, a fifteenth-century text called the Nimatnama, or the Book of Delights describes numerous versions of samosas favoured by the Khilji royals and not one of them contained the potato. The rich Awadhi biryani underwent a transition when Nawab Wajid Ali Shah was exiled to Calcutta. Shorn of the wealth of yore, his chefs improvised to keep the biryanis as toothsome and filling by introducing the potato to make up for the inadequate meat. This became the precursor for the famous Kolkata-style biryani where the whole potato, redolent with the flavours of meat and spices, is an integral part of the dish.
Khichdis, pilafs and biryanis in other parts of India also incorporated the potato into their recipes, a marriage between the starches that was designed to last.
The potato now
Potato cultivation increased in a big way in the 20th Century with the introduction of modern agricultural methods. From a production of 1.5 million tonnes in 1949-50 to 48605000 tonnes in 2017, the potato continues its growth story in the new millennium. In order to aid the large number of potato farmers in the country and address the issue of low pricing, the centre as well as state government offer several subsidies on transport and freight.
Aloo, Batata, Uralaikilangu, Kook, Alu, Urulakizhangu… there is a name for a potato across Indian languages that matches its ubiquitous presence across cuisines. Today, the potato in India makes up a world of breakfasts comprising aloo parathas, puris with a tangy aloo curries, masala dosas with a soft potato stuffing or grilled chutney and potato sandwiches.
Take a look at the everyday lunch or dinner — from the Bihari aloo chokha (mashed potatoes tempered with green chillies and onions) to the spicy yogurt based Kashmiri dum aloo; from the Bengali aloo posto (potatoes cooked in a poppy seed paste) to the Manipuri eromba (mashed potatoes with bamboo shoot chutney and dried fish); from the spicy Kerala potato roast to the aromatic Maharashtrian batatyachi bhaji, it isn’t a stretch to call the potato one of the pivots of Indian cuisine whether as a hero ingredient or in a supporting role.
In order to hold on to their caste privileges, Brahmins would treat all food coming from outside as suspect and therefore taboo. However over time, these beliefs broke down and the gradual prevalence of potatoes in our daily diet made it an acceptable food even on days of religious feasts. It is only among the Jain community that the potato continues to be forbidden since the plant has to be uprooted (hence destroyed) for consumption.
It is this prevalence that creates the need for the potato to be a reassuring presence in markets unblighted by price fluctuations or scarcity. And in times of inflation, it is an upswing in potato prices that throw budgets off for all, from a regular middle-class home to a street food vendor and an upscale restaurant.
In the early days of lockdown, people in India stocked up in bulk. Primary among their list of pandemic staples—rice, dal and potatoes. A case in point for the unchanged promise of the potato—to sustain and nourish in good times and bad.
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June 22, 2020 at 10:38PM
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How the potato came to India and conquered our lives - Condé Nast Traveller India
"potato" - Google News
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