Healthy Potatoes.

Healthiest ways to cook potatoes

 

You can probably guess that smothering your potato in sour cream and bacon isn't the healthiest way to enjoy it, but what is? Which is more nutritious — baked, boiled or steamed potatoes?
Jarzabkowski emphasized the importance of preparation in potato consumption. "The best way to eat a potato is in its whole, unprocessed form," she said. Baking a potato is the best way to prepare it, as baking, or microwaving, a potato causes the lowest amount of nutrients to be lost, she said.
The next-healthiest way to cook a potato is through steaming, which causes less nutrient loss than boiling. Cooking a peeled potato in this way results in significant nutrient loss, as the water-soluble nutrients leach out into the water.
In a potato, those water-soluble nutrients include B-complex vitamins, vitamin C, potassium and calcium. As much as 80 percent of a potato's vitamin C may go down the drain if you boil the vegetable. The same thing can happen with peeled potatoes that are left to soak, a method used to stop darkening. If you use the water from the potato boil as stock, however, you'll still get some of the nutrients.
However you cook a potato, try to eat the skin. Ounce for ounce, the skin contains more nutrients — including the majority of the vegetable's fiber — than the rest of the potato, Jarzabkowski said.

Are potato eyes poisonous?

If the eyes of a potato are not sprouting, they can be eaten. If they are sprouting, the National Institutes of Health recommends cutting off the eyes and their sprouts before eating the potato.
Potato stems, branches, leaves and fruits are toxic, containing alkaloids such as arsenic, chaconine and solanine. Solanine is "very toxic even in small amounts," according to the NIH.
Poison is also found in green potatoes. The vegetables turn green if they have had too much exposure to light. According to the NIH, you should "never eat potatoes that are spoiled or green below the skin."

Potato facts

Here are some potato facts, from the U.S. Potato Board and the Idaho Potato Museum:
Like tomatoes, eggplants and peppers, potatoes are members of the nightshade family. They are not root vegetables; potatoes are actually the swollen part of the stem of the perennial Solanum tuberosum. This part of the plant is called a tuber, which functions to provide food to the leafy part of the plant. The "eyes" of potatoes are buds, which will sprout into branches if left alone.
The word "potato" comes from the Spanish "patata."
The nickname "spud" comes from the digging tool used in planting potatoes: "espada" in Spanish, "spyd" in Dutch and "spade" in English. The word eventually became associated with the potato itself. It is a myth that the word is an acronym for the Society for the Prevention of an Unwholesome Diet, a supposed activist group that wanted to keep the potato out of Britain in the 19th century.
There are thousands of potato varieties, but not all are commercially available. Popular varieties include Russet, red, white, yellow, purple/blue, fingerling and petite.
Potatoes are grown in all 50 U.S. states. The top-producing states in 2012 were Idaho, Washington, Wisconsin, North Dakota, Oregon, Colorado, Minnesota, Michigan, Maine and California.
In 2013, there were more than 1 million acres of potatoes planted and harvested, which produced 43.7 billion lbs. (20 billion kg) of the vegetable.
The average American eats about 124 lbs. (56 kg) of potatoes per year; Germans eat about twice as much.
Potatoes were traditionally used to make vodka, although today most vodka is produced using fermented grains such as corn, wheat or rye.
According to Guinness World Records, the largest potato grown was 7 lbs., 1 ounce (3.2 kg).
The Inca in Peru were the first to cultivate potatoes, growing the vegetables around 8000 B.C. to 5000 B.C.
In 1536, Spanish Conquistadors conquered Peru, and carried potatoes back to Europe.
Sir Walter Raleigh introduced potatoes to Ireland in 1589. It took nearly four decades for the potato to spread to the rest of Europe. Because potatoes were not mentioned in the Bible, many people looked at them with suspicion. For many years, people thought that eating potatoes would cause leprosy.
Potatoes arrived in the British colonies in 1621 when the governor of Bermuda, Nathaniel Butler, sent two large cedar chests containing potatoes and other vegetables to Gov. Francis Wyatt at Jamestown.
The first permanent potato patches in North America were established in 1719, most likely near Londonderry, New Hampshire, by Scotch-Irish immigrants.
A royal chef named A. Parmentier helped King Louis XIV popularize the potato in France in the 18th century. He created a feast with only potato dishes, which he realized was possible when he was fed only potatoes while imprisoned in Germany. Benjamin Franklin, ambassador to France, was in attendance at Parmentier's feast in 1767.
Marie Antoinette turned potatoes into a fashion statement when she paraded through the French countryside wearing potato blossoms in her hair.
French fries were introduced to the United States by Thomas Jefferson, who served them in the White House during his presidency (1801-1809).
Another royal chef, Collinet, chef for French King Louis Phillippe, unintentionally created soufflés, or puffed potatoes, one night in the mid-1800s. When the king arrived late for dinner, Collinet plunged already-fried potatoes into extremely hot oil to reheat them. To the chef's surprise and the king's delight, the potatoes puffed up like little balloons.
The Irish Potato Famine: In the 1840s, an outbreak of potato blight swept through Europe and wiped out the potato crop in many countries. The Irish working class lived largely on potatoes, and when the blight reached Ireland, the residents' main staple food disappeared. Many poverty-stricken families struggled to survive. Over the course of the famine, almost 1 million people died from starvation or disease. Another million left Ireland, mostly for Canada and the United States.
In 1853, railroad magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt complained that his potatoes were cut too thick and sent them back to the kitchen at a resort in Saratoga Springs, New York. To spite him, the chef, George Crum, sliced some potatoes paper thin, fried them in hot oil, salted and served them. To everyone's surprise, Vanderbilt loved his "Saratoga Crunch Chips," and the potato chip was born.
The potato was the first vegetable to be grown in space. In October 1995, NASA and the University of Wisconsin created the technology to do so with the goal of feeding astronauts on long space voyages.