To Fry or To Chip

All good things have painful histories behind them, so did the potato, father of the French Fry.

But lets start at the beginning. There was only the potato, to begin with. And it was a very closely guarded secret in the South American wildernesses, in the area of Peru, Ecuador, Chile, thousands of years ago, where it was a tasty treasure of the Incas. This civilization discovered the potato-growing wild, sometime around 750 BC and started using them as foodstuffs, as medicines, even to tell the time. Over the centuries, the podgy little spud became an inseparable part of their culture. Potato deities were worshipped and sometimes Gods had to be appeased when the potato crop failed.

The secret was not exposed to the rest of the world (just like its place of birth and the Incan civilization), and it was only in the early sixteenth century that the Spaniards who conquered the Incan Empire took this little black, unattractive looking tuber back with them to Europe, but were still doubtful about eating it. They lovingly called it `the inedible stone" However, back in South America, it was used by the invading soldiers as a nutritious and filling food.

In 1596 the English accidentally got their first introduction to the potato, when Sir Francis Drake set sail for England after having conquered the Caribbean regions, wresting them away from the Spanish. He took some potatoes for the trip. He is said to have stopped over at Virginia to pick up some homesick British soldiers, one of whom took a sample of this plant to a botanist friend, John Gerard. This botanist introduced the potato to the world, as a product of Virginia in 1597. The fact was that it wasn’t until the seventeenth century that potatoes arrived on American soil!! When it did, it was due to the Irishmen who had settled in New Hampshire.

The fact was that in Europe, only the Irish were willing to brave all the rumors surrounding this little veggie, and still eat it. Many believed it was poisonous because it belonged to the same botanical family as belladonna, that it caused leprosy because it had given a rash once, that it was not mentioned in the bible hence was unholy, and all sorts of other ridiculous stories. It was only the Irish who favored it, the tuber grew well in their climate and also provided the nutrition the growing population in Ireland needed. It was also considered an aphrodisiac, but that didn’t bother them!! In fact, it was so identified with the Irish that in 1733, the English seedsman Stephen Switzer summed up popular opinion of the potato as "that which was heretofore reckon'd a food fit only for Irishmen and clowns."

In 1588 the potato had arrived in Germany but was considered fit only for consumption of prisoners. Only in 1744 King William ordered peasants to plant them, in order to save them from famine, that it got acceptance as regular food.

It was, however, in Germany that potatoes got their best ally to, as Antoine August Parmentier, a French Chemist who had lived on potatoes while held captive during the seven-year war. When he returned home, he used all his PR powers to gain acceptance for the humble tuber and succeeded. He published a thesis on "Inquiry into nourishing vegetables that at times of necessity could be substituted for ordinary food" in 1773, and also brought a bouquet of potato flowers to King Louis XVI’s birthday party. The king was gracious enough to place a flower in his lapel and his wife; Queen Marie Antoinette wore them in her hair. The Potato had arrived.

The smart chemist decided to continue his potato popularizing activity, throwing parties where up to twenty dishes were made of potatoes, and also obtained permission to plant an acre with potato plants. The real strategy was yet to come. The acre was fastidiously guarded during the day and left unsecured during the night. Curiosities were aroused as to why such an ordinary field needs to be guarded and sure enough, thefts of the plant became regular during the nights. Soon enough, the potato found its way throughout the French countryside. By 1813, the potato had gained acceptance in Scotland, Holland, Austria, Switzerland, Germany and Italy. Thanks to the French, potatoes were finally deemed chic enough to eat.

The potato was such an important part of the Irish diet that almost 20% of their population was wiped out in the middle of the seventeenth century, when a potato crop failed. In 1845, another potato famine hit Ireland and this time they migrated in great numbers to the United States.

Not very long thereafter, someone decided to drop a slice of potato into boiling oil and probably discovered the potato chip. No, it wasn’t as simple as that. In fact there is a veritable war of opinions as to who actually invented the potato chip. The French claim it was their countryman and the Belgian claim likewise. So we are not really too sure if we should be calling it French or Belgian Fries??? Whoever it was, by the middle of the 18th century, Fries had become a popular snack as well as a part of a meal across Europe. To reach America, it took them another 100 years. Thomas Jefferson sampled them in Paris and brought the recipe home. At a White House dinner in 1802, the menu included "potatoes served in the French manner." But that's not how they got their name.

American soldiers stationed in France during the World War developed a taste for the French Fries, watched this fad and yearned for the greasy, tasty little welts back home. Maybe that’s the reason why French Fries are considered so French in the USA.

Today, McDonalds has the credit for selling the perfect French Fry but it took years to perfect and millions of dollars in investment. When they first served French Fries they were often limp, over oily, sometimes over browned, sometimes underdone, in short, completely off the mark. A lot of research later they decided that fresh potatoes made bad fries, those cured for three weeks before frying gave the perfectly fried fry!! So it stands today, but of course, with a lot of other innovations too.

Potato Chips, as we know them today, are the handiwork of a piqued Chef, unable to satisfy an overtly demanding guest. In 1835, at the Moon Lake House Hotel in Saratoga Springs, the railroad magnate Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt asked for fried potatoes the way the French made them. The Chef tried his best, but the Commodore still found them too thick. Finally the Chef, George Crum got so mad that he sliced the potato paper-thin, fried them to a crisp in oil, and then doused them with salt. Vanderbilt thought they were great! "Saratoga Crisps" thus became a popular item on the hotel's menu. But these had to be eaten fresh. Commercial sale of potato chips did not begin before they could come up with a proper packaging method that would keep them crisp. This happened only in 1926 when A Mrs. Scudder came up with a waxed-paper potato-chip bag. This Chip became a rage.

But for a long time, potato chips were a Northern dish, at best. In the 1920s, a traveling salesman from the South, Herman Lay, helped popularize the chip, trying to peddle potato chips to the Southern grocers out of a trunk in his car, thus a business was built up in his name and the chip acquired the name of Lay’s Chips. It slowly became a successfully marketed nationwide brand and in 1961, Herman Lay made a strategic alliance, with Dallas based Frito Chips. In 1965, Lay’s Potato Chips were also marketed under their brand worldwide and in 1970, Lay’s potato chip sales top the $1 billion mark.

Today, Americans consume about six million pounds of potatoes in the form of fries every year, the average American eating about thirty pounds of Fries a year. Today the small stony veggie that Spaniards rejected- is the world’s second most popular staple food.

For years it was believed that eating potato shortened one’s lifespan because it contained an aphrodisiac. Today people swear by potato chips, they are consumed with almost the same passion as that which drives sex, sometimes, it is as satisfying too!!!