Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome
Speaker 1: back to the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always
Speaker 1: so much for tuning in. That's our super producer, the
Speaker 1: one and only Max Williams. They called me Ben and
Speaker 1: I gotta tell you. Out of all the carbs, all
Speaker 1: the carbs in the world, potatoes are number one for me. Sorry,
Speaker 1: beer potatoes, stick him in a stew, Taters, spuds, Uh,
Speaker 1: just make up dirt munches, Tubers, tubers, there you go. Tubers.
Speaker 1: Tubers actually refers to like what the thing that they
Speaker 1: grow from, right, sort of like bulbs, sort of like
Speaker 1: tulip bulbs. I think the things you plant to grow
Speaker 1: potatoes are called tubers or it's it's it's like a
Speaker 1: genre of of root of edible root, right yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: It's the underground part of a stem or a rhyme
Speaker 1: that serves as a food reserve. It does bear buds
Speaker 1: from which new plants can grow. Right, It's like when
Speaker 1: you take a potato and you stick it, you can
Speaker 1: you can actually grow potato from a potato, the like
Speaker 1: you know when you actually when you leave a potato
Speaker 1: out for too long, those tubers start to come out
Speaker 1: almost like some sort of weird Cathulu esque creepers. I'm
Speaker 1: no old, by the way, Yes, yes, your nol and
Speaker 1: a potato is a typical tuber. It's a great example
Speaker 1: of a delicious tuber. All you need is a little
Speaker 1: bit of salt, some some butter, source of heat and
Speaker 1: in imagination, and you can. You can take potatoes pretty far.
Speaker 1: It's true, it's true, but a lot like other, you know,
Speaker 1: earlier forms of of food stuffs that we now know
Speaker 1: and enjoy, like the banana potatoes, weren't always the potatoes
Speaker 1: we know and love today, were they? No, they weren't old.
Speaker 1: I love that you're bringing this up. So this is
Speaker 1: this is odd. This has happened a couple of times
Speaker 1: in Europe. There are some uh, some specific types of
Speaker 1: produce or even dishes that become closely associated with a
Speaker 1: given country, But those fruits and vegetables or tubers in
Speaker 1: this case, are not themselves native to the European continent.
Speaker 1: You know, some people are surprised to learn that tomatoes
Speaker 1: were not native to Italy and weren't around for a
Speaker 1: long long time, And the same is true with Ireland
Speaker 1: and potatoes. Are you implying the potatoes migrate, yes, Monty
Speaker 1: python reference, but no, it's true. I mean potatoes, he can't.
Speaker 1: You're inseparable from from the Irish culture almost like in
Speaker 1: this cliche, sort of obnoxious, almost condescending, the idea of
Speaker 1: of Irish Irish being sort of simple folk potato farmers,
Speaker 1: like subsisting on very bland foods, and of course the
Speaker 1: famous potato blight or the potato famine of Irish history
Speaker 1: is also a huge part of of that country's identity.
Speaker 1: But they're you're right, they're not native to um Ireland
Speaker 1: at all. In fact that they're not native to anywhere
Speaker 1: in Europe. They originally were domesticated in the Andes Mountains
Speaker 1: in Peru, also in northwest Bolivia, and they were used
Speaker 1: for food as far back as eight thousand b C.
Speaker 1: We've got a great article from Mental Floss about the
Speaker 1: history of potatoes. Highly recommend checking that one out. But
Speaker 1: they didn't taste the same back then either. They were
Speaker 1: oddly shaped, or at least oddly compared to the you know,
Speaker 1: very typical oblong potato shape that we know and left today.
Speaker 1: But they also tasted bitter, and you know how some
Speaker 1: vegetables have a little bit of a bitter taste, and
Speaker 1: then when you cook them that can kind of dissipate
Speaker 1: a little bit. This is not the case. No amount
Speaker 1: of preparation or cooking could get rid of that bitter taste.
Speaker 1: And also some of them were toxic, and lamas had
Speaker 1: a really great trick for making sure they didn't die
Speaker 1: from eating these bitter potatoes. Right, yeah, yeah, that bitter
Speaker 1: taste was you know, a little bit of poison, not
Speaker 1: a ton, just a touch, just a touch of poison. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Lava's would lick clay before they ate potatoes in the wild,
Speaker 1: and the poisonous parts of these potatoes essentially would stick
Speaker 1: with the clay particles and then it would travel safely
Speaker 1: through the animals body. So people in the Andes noticed this,
Speaker 1: and then they started dunking their potatoes in a mixture
Speaker 1: they had made of clay and water. You know, this
Speaker 1: wasn't actually hote cuisine, but it did make the potato
Speaker 1: edible and a little more enjoyable. And we're on a
Speaker 1: bit of a quest today to understand how the human
Speaker 1: species got from lama impersonators in Peru, at least when
Speaker 1: it comes to cuisine, all the way to the modern
Speaker 1: day when potatoes are a worldwide phenomenon and they're especially
Speaker 1: popular in Europe, because, as we're going to see, this
Speaker 1: was not always the case. But like you said, no Peru,
Speaker 1: that's where our story starts. This was a very important
Speaker 1: food stuff for people in the Andes Mountains. This was
Speaker 1: a staple product. And we know this went on for
Speaker 1: centuries and centuries in that part of the world. But
Speaker 1: the fact is, you guys, no one had seen a
Speaker 1: potato in Europe. No European had seen a spud before
Speaker 1: Spanish conquistadors invaded South America way back in what the
Speaker 1: early Fires fifteen thirty and over through the Incan Empire Yepe.
Speaker 1: And with that, like many things we see that to
Speaker 1: start popping up in Europe usually come from some sort
Speaker 1: of tragedy, traumatic cultural events, or decimation. So is the
Speaker 1: case with the potato. I just want to add one
Speaker 1: more little thing. There's a really great little tidbit in
Speaker 1: the Mental Flaws article by Michelle deb Check that even today,
Speaker 1: those uh slightly poisonous potatoes, you can still get them
Speaker 1: at andy and markets and they're sold with like a
Speaker 1: little digestion aid, a little packet of this digestion aiding
Speaker 1: clay um kind of mixture. So though, that was pretty interesting,
Speaker 1: and it just shows that, you know, even if it's poison,
Speaker 1: tradition is is important. But you're right, Ben, Around the
Speaker 1: mid fifteen thirties, the Incan Empire was overthrown by Spanish conquistadores,
Speaker 1: and so came the spud, the noble spud to Europe
Speaker 1: in the sixteenth century. But it was not met with
Speaker 1: open arms, Ben, it was not met with open arms.
Speaker 1: The Spa Nish brought the potato back from South America,
Speaker 1: and at this point they kind of bread it or
Speaker 1: cultivated it in such a way that it was totally edible.
Speaker 1: You didn't have to, you know, mix it with dirt
Speaker 1: or clay dustin people did that. The Spanish didn't help.
Speaker 1: The Spanish did not. Now they were not about that life.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing, and I love this socially. Those
Speaker 1: tubers we were talking about, Um, well, this is a myth,
Speaker 1: I think. But it's interesting cause you heard about a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff that is easily debunked. The idea that
Speaker 1: Europeans didn't like any um plants or or you know,
Speaker 1: food stuff that weren't expressly mentioned in the Bible. Shout
Speaker 1: out to the State for anybody who remembers the fantastic,
Speaker 1: wildly underrated sketch show the State. There's this wonderful sketch
Speaker 1: where they talk about whether or not penguins or in
Speaker 1: the Bible. Uh, this this family and that's that's kind
Speaker 1: of a descendant of this idea. This did happen, though,
Speaker 1: this has been debunked in different cases, right, different specific cases.
Speaker 1: But we do know that more conservative people of the
Speaker 1: time time literally would say, well, I don't know, it's
Speaker 1: not in the Bible. Is not in the Bible? Did
Speaker 1: if it was in the Bible, it would have wrote
Speaker 1: it down right, so but I would have ridded it down.
Speaker 1: That is a pitch perfect sixteenth century Flemish accent, really wondering, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I applaud you, um, but okay, so we
Speaker 1: know this has been debunked, Like I think, what we're
Speaker 1: tomatoes not mentioned the Bible, and there was like a
Speaker 1: theory that that was when we talked about tomatoes, and
Speaker 1: the idea that people thought they were poisoned too and
Speaker 1: that they weren't mentioned in the Bible was a thing.
Speaker 1: But anyway, there's there's lots of examples of that. But
Speaker 1: another reason for suspicion around these edible underground rudy boys
Speaker 1: or the fact that they were grown from these tuber
Speaker 1: things that vaguely resembled the boils on the skin of lepers.
Speaker 1: So yeah, here's the thing. We we know that there
Speaker 1: there are a couple of other issues, right, like cabbage
Speaker 1: didn't get a lot of shine, and a Bible cabbish
Speaker 1: doesn't have an awesome cameo moment, but it was still
Speaker 1: really popular tulips that that was also happening at the
Speaker 1: same time that didn't seem to bother people. And you know,
Speaker 1: when we're looking at the expansion of all these all
Speaker 1: these new types of unseen fruit and vegetable or never
Speaker 1: before seeing fruit and vegetable arriving in Europe from North
Speaker 1: and South America, we know that people are dealing with
Speaker 1: a lot of crazy things they haven't seen before, right,
Speaker 1: and they're trying to compare them two things they already
Speaker 1: are aware of. Check out our pineapple episode, because that's
Speaker 1: that's a wild ride. So the other issue here is
Speaker 1: that South American climates are not like the climates that
Speaker 1: you will find in Western Europe, especially when you talk
Speaker 1: about hours of daylight per day during winter and so on.
Speaker 1: So when they take these buds, these tubers to Europe,
Speaker 1: they see the potatoes grow leaves and flowers, and the
Speaker 1: learned folks of the day are studying up on them.
Speaker 1: But the tubers they create don't quite get to the
Speaker 1: size of potatoes and peru because they, you know, they're
Speaker 1: in a different climate. And so the Spanish started trying
Speaker 1: to figure out where they could grow these, similar to
Speaker 1: the way that the English were trying to figure out
Speaker 1: how they could grow pineapples. And if you haven't listened
Speaker 1: to that episode yet, do check it out. What a
Speaker 1: weird people used to rent pineapples. It's it didn't happen
Speaker 1: with potatoes. Now one start written in potatoes yet. But
Speaker 1: well they weren't very pretty again, like I said, people
Speaker 1: thought they resembled the kind of stunted, little nubby things
Speaker 1: that would form on on the skin of lepers or
Speaker 1: when their fingers would be have to be removed, etcetera
Speaker 1: very very ghastly kind of stuff. I just want to
Speaker 1: point out I had my mom did this like Christmas
Speaker 1: in July thing because you know, or you know, COVID
Speaker 1: relatively being somewhat dealt with enough to at least like,
Speaker 1: hug your grandma. We hadn't seen our family, um, you know,
Speaker 1: members in in a long time, even before covid um.
Speaker 1: So we did a little Christmas in July thing and
Speaker 1: I went, I couldn't notice that she had this massive
Speaker 1: pineapple in this fruit ball that clearly was not for consumption,
Speaker 1: was clearly just for decoration. And I mentioned to her that, hey,
Speaker 1: you know, back in the day, this would have cost
Speaker 1: you a pretty penny just to rent um. But no,
Speaker 1: definitely not the case with potatoes. But they did start um.
Speaker 1: Potatoes were prettier back then, though, weren't they been. They
Speaker 1: like actually flowered and they would be studied by botanists.
Speaker 1: These potato flowers. He's kind of like very um or
Speaker 1: nate little blooms, right, yeah, yeah, Like I was saying,
Speaker 1: the climate was such that they could have these leaves
Speaker 1: and flowers. But again, the tubers themselves were not reaching
Speaker 1: the size that you could find in South America. So
Speaker 1: the Spanish did something that was pretty intelligent. They were
Speaker 1: aware of the climate and they said, okay, we'll try
Speaker 1: to grow potatoes somewhere else. We'll grow them on the
Speaker 1: Canary Islands, which is kind of think of it like
Speaker 1: the Goldilocks zone between the northern climate of Europe and
Speaker 1: the more equatorial climate of South America. Still, when we
Speaker 1: talk about the controversy, I think it's hard for a
Speaker 1: lot of us in the modern day realize or to
Speaker 1: think of potatoes as a controversial thing, because for many
Speaker 1: of us, wherever you are in the world or most
Speaker 1: most places in the world, potatoes are a common known,
Speaker 1: very nod controversial thing, right nobody. It's not what you
Speaker 1: know part by French. But it's not as if any
Speaker 1: of us are gonna hop on to record ridiculous history.
Speaker 1: And you guys asked me what I had to eat,
Speaker 1: and I'll say, oh, I got a Patty Melt and
Speaker 1: some hash browns. And then here Max go, oh, like
Speaker 1: that's with holy water? Did you? Did you say the
Speaker 1: sacraments above it? You know that that was the thing? Yeah?
Speaker 1: You know what's not in the Bible? Right, Okay? Were
Speaker 1: you okay with that? You had planted it as a
Speaker 1: specific time to write some particularly on Good Friday, to
Speaker 1: prevent it for my guests becoming evil again, those little
Speaker 1: troopers are kind of creepy looking. I look at them
Speaker 1: and I can't not think of like the eldritche you know,
Speaker 1: gods or whatever, like the hundred hundred percent there's like
Speaker 1: what do they call it called those been the sprouting
Speaker 1: or fruited. Uh, you know members, I guess that come
Speaker 1: out of It's the thing in the Last of Us Games,
Speaker 1: good good, good stuff, good franchise. But here's the thing.
Speaker 1: What we what we need now, Ben, what what history
Speaker 1: needs now is a potato evangelists, someone to to come
Speaker 1: and normalize potatoes and really, you know, sing its praises
Speaker 1: of the humble potato. And we got that in the
Speaker 1: form of Antoine Augustine Perimentier, who was like he could
Speaker 1: consider him like the ultimate hype man for the potato.
Speaker 1: He's a potato promoter, he's a potato proselytizer, he's a
Speaker 1: spud spokesman, he's a he's a tater uh trumpeter. Uh.
Speaker 1: We could get a different term for that one. We'll
Speaker 1: fix it in post max fix that what I posted.
Speaker 1: But now this dude. Uh. Antoine Augustine Permanentier was born
Speaker 1: in seventeen thirty seven. Um. He went on to become
Speaker 1: a pharmacist he was French, obviously, in the French army
Speaker 1: during the Seven Years War. There's a really excellent article
Speaker 1: from Atlas Obscure that also gives a wonderful rundown of
Speaker 1: the history of the potato by Jim Clark. Highly recommend
Speaker 1: shocking that out went out, and we're gonna pull some
Speaker 1: information from that article as well today. But yeah, pharmacist
Speaker 1: during the Seven Years War. Um he actually became a
Speaker 1: prisoner of war, during which time the Prussians gave their
Speaker 1: prisoners potatoes, and the French at the time, um, as
Speaker 1: we've discussed, still viewed potatoes quite negatively. Yeah, yeah, which
Speaker 1: is crazy because some of my favorite potato recipes are
Speaker 1: French influence. Now. But anyway, this is the thing. So
Speaker 1: imagine you're in prison in Prussia. Life stinks, right, and
Speaker 1: you're this pharmacist parmenter and he's eating these potatoes in prison,
Speaker 1: and he goes, these things are actually not bad, they're
Speaker 1: not deadly, they're they're actually they're pretty great. Like I'm
Speaker 1: thinking right now, just on their own seven out of ten,
Speaker 1: and I can make it a nine partmentist thinking. He
Speaker 1: is eventually released at the end of the war after
Speaker 1: three years have passed and he can't stop thinking about
Speaker 1: these potatoes. It's like it's weird they're on his mind.
Speaker 1: He's been through a literal war, you guys, and people
Speaker 1: are asking him about the war and how he was
Speaker 1: a p O dup you in Prussia and he's like, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: have you Have you heard of potatoes though, because like
Speaker 1: I've the war. That's a five minute conversation. But I
Speaker 1: have like two days. If you want to talk taters
Speaker 1: with me. I do want to shout out. Rebecca Earle
Speaker 1: a professor in the Department of History at the University
Speaker 1: of Warwick. She wrote an awesome book called Feeding the
Speaker 1: People The Politics of the Potato. We're gonna be pulling
Speaker 1: some citations from her in a piece she wrote called
Speaker 1: How Potatoes Conquered the World. I just wanted to shout out.
Speaker 1: If you like books about very specific things like me,
Speaker 1: then check out Dr Earl's Politics of the Potato. So, Ben,
Speaker 1: you're asking me about the potato and I'm like, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I heard it was of the devil, you know.
Speaker 1: I don't trust it. I don't don't want to it
Speaker 1: was poisonous um change my mind. Wait wait, so that's im.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I got the table. I'm like, I got
Speaker 1: the table with the sign. That's his potatoes are of
Speaker 1: the devil change and that's Premier's job is to change
Speaker 1: my mind. There are collective minds as a nation. How
Speaker 1: does he do it? How does he do it? So
Speaker 1: first off, he says, you know, study thyself. And he's like,
Speaker 1: I pretty much just ate potatoes for three years and
Speaker 1: I'm alive. I feel good. I feel pretty pro tator.
Speaker 1: Uh that was a rough one. We stuck the landing Max.
Speaker 1: Now Max doesn't approve of that one. So I think
Speaker 1: I'm going to get a growing soundtrack for that one.
Speaker 1: I earned it. Uh. So there's this historical novelist Katherine Dolores.
Speaker 1: Katherine Dolores writes quite a bit about this and says
Speaker 1: that it was typical of the time for people to
Speaker 1: challenge these old ideas. So, no, you're the guy at
Speaker 1: the table saying change my mind and put mine says
Speaker 1: I am going to change your mind. I'm not just
Speaker 1: gonna bore you with a bunch of science and a
Speaker 1: bud to facts. I'm gonna do some flair. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have some pizzazz on this I'm gonna I'm gonna wow you.
Speaker 1: We're gonna shock in all you in a war for
Speaker 1: the hearts and minds of people when it comes to potatoes.
Speaker 1: So at this time we have to mention this is
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy two. His first step is to get the
Speaker 1: French government and the medical community doctors on board, and
Speaker 1: as Farmers Almanac reports, France had had a potato band
Speaker 1: for a while. Did you see that? I mean really
Speaker 1: they were just like, you know what, it's not enough
Speaker 1: to just kind of malign the poor potato. Let's just
Speaker 1: outright ban it, like schedule it like a drug or
Speaker 1: something like that. What was their reasoning? Was it because
Speaker 1: of the poison potential or was it because they just
Speaker 1: just didn't like it? They thought it was it was low. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I love the idea of a French p s A
Speaker 1: from the seventeen hundreds, like oh your children eating potatoes,
Speaker 1: and then all kinds of weird you know, like war
Speaker 1: on drugs esque facts, which true stories, school children are
Speaker 1: leaving school to dig to the ground with their bare hands,
Speaker 1: all in the search for a spud, don't don't speaking
Speaker 1: of which been that term spud actually comes from the
Speaker 1: hole that you dig to make the to plant the potato.
Speaker 1: That's the sput and also refers to like a short
Speaker 1: blunt knife that might have been used to dig those
Speaker 1: uh those holes for for planting potatoes. I was looking
Speaker 1: at up on the fly. I didn't know. That's awesome, man,
Speaker 1: thank you for the I love somato biology. We also
Speaker 1: do know why, roughly why the French band the potato.
Speaker 1: French Parliament banned them in seventeen because they believed that
Speaker 1: this resemblance to leprosy. Right, the way the potato reminded
Speaker 1: them of leprosy was therefore indictative, like was therefore going
Speaker 1: to create leprosy and people that consumed it. So they
Speaker 1: thought they were outlawing a vector for a disease. Isn't
Speaker 1: it funny how so much stuff was based on just
Speaker 1: sheer observational observation alone, based on no science. But we
Speaker 1: have to remember, though, this was the beginning of the Enlightenment,
Speaker 1: which is partly I think why Permans got a little traction,
Speaker 1: because people were beginning to open up their minds to
Speaker 1: not think that way right, to be more like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, let's just give it a try. Um, let's
Speaker 1: try some new things. Maybe looks can be deceiving, and
Speaker 1: it turns out he was pretty successful in that in
Speaker 1: that campaign. Yeah, and they were also we have to
Speaker 1: remember they were driven by starvation as much as to like,
Speaker 1: if you if you have people who are are experiencing
Speaker 1: food insecurity, then of course some of those social taboos
Speaker 1: are going to loosen up a bit. Yeah, So Parmentier
Speaker 1: does this thing that is pretty clever. He first goes
Speaker 1: to scientific institutions, specifically the Presation Faculty of Medicine, and then,
Speaker 1: according to Katherine Dolores, what he's after is an official
Speaker 1: statement that potatoes are not even good for you, but
Speaker 1: not as dangerous as they have been believed to be.
Speaker 1: So it's kind of like he said, it's kind of
Speaker 1: like he's he's saying, look, potatoes are on the level
Speaker 1: of a firearm, but they're not a nuclear bob, just
Speaker 1: say that. And because people have pretty much everybody alive
Speaker 1: at this point in France has been alive during some
Speaker 1: period of food and security, and there have been a
Speaker 1: recent harvest that failed in seventeen seventy, so there was
Speaker 1: already a prize out for anybody who could who could,
Speaker 1: you know, offer solutions to this recurrent problem with famine,
Speaker 1: and that they were probably expecting stuff like a new
Speaker 1: kind of planting technique or a new kind of irrigation system.
Speaker 1: They weren't expecting the profit of potatoes to come through.
Speaker 1: And he went hard in the paint. He published this
Speaker 1: essay called Quree and the Newish and Vegetables that in
Speaker 1: times of necessity he could substitute for ordinary food breath.
Speaker 1: Who my goodness, these uh, these titles for these essays
Speaker 1: back then, we're not it got the job done right
Speaker 1: so absolutely that he could consider that his like potato treatise,
Speaker 1: and he had sort of a three pronged approach to
Speaker 1: gaining wide acceptance of the potato. First, he needed to
Speaker 1: get the French governments and the medical community on board,
Speaker 1: because again there was still a little bit of vagueness
Speaker 1: around whether the potatoes were even safe. So uh, in
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy two, um, after he published this treatise, he
Speaker 1: started to circulate this among government officials that he was
Speaker 1: tight with um and people in the medical community, so
Speaker 1: they started to be more of a conversation around it. Next,
Speaker 1: of course, is to you know, gotta sex them up
Speaker 1: a little bit dressed that humble pot hato up in
Speaker 1: a nice cocktail dress and send it out on the town.
Speaker 1: So he did that, and he started to introduce potatoes
Speaker 1: to Paris is uh sort of bougier high society types, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: and this is an important step. So he gets some
Speaker 1: of the big v I P names of the day,
Speaker 1: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, noted chemist in France to come
Speaker 1: to his dinners, which are these pretty high class affairs
Speaker 1: centered on the humble potato. And just to give you
Speaker 1: a sense of how profoundly potato centric this was, he
Speaker 1: would have as many as twenty courses featuring potatoes. And
Speaker 1: it seems that this is a cool story. So Noel,
Speaker 1: max you guys like French fries, right, you're not against
Speaker 1: the right what kind of what? What's your favorite French
Speaker 1: fry type or what are some of your favorites? Maxico, First,
Speaker 1: I need to think for a second. I mean, you
Speaker 1: can never like be like the classic MacDonald's fries. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't eat fast food really ever, but your high
Speaker 1: road high road now yes, yes, somewhat yeah, but I
Speaker 1: mean they're just like, you know, the quintessential fries. I
Speaker 1: mean they're over salted. There's virtually no potato to it.
Speaker 1: It's just been deep fried. It's just a vessel for
Speaker 1: something to be fried. And I think that makes them
Speaker 1: pretty much amazing. I like a good home fry. I
Speaker 1: like a potato wedge. Shout out to one of our
Speaker 1: favorite local bars and restaurants, the Righteous Room. They do
Speaker 1: a really really nice crispy on the outside, soft on
Speaker 1: the inside, Serve it up with a little of that
Speaker 1: salt and uh and a vinegar, a malt vinegar, and
Speaker 1: that's an excellent potato. But you're right, Max, I do
Speaker 1: think the French fry, or oftentimes the potato, it can
Speaker 1: be just a flavor vector, not not a vector for
Speaker 1: disease though, right right, dive actor for disease. Hey, I'll
Speaker 1: tell you I had some I get this weird thing
Speaker 1: with steak fries. Specifically, I don't trust them because they're
Speaker 1: like they're well, they're mashed potatoes in disguise, you know,
Speaker 1: like the big steak fries. But to teach their own,
Speaker 1: the Righteous Room does kill it with the potato wedges.
Speaker 1: Tell him, tell him we sent you. But the the
Speaker 1: thing is, there's so many varieties of French fry. They
Speaker 1: it's hard to believe they didn't really exist in the
Speaker 1: US for a long time until or what would become
Speaker 1: the US for a long time, North America and Canada
Speaker 1: until Thomas Jefferson. This is not confirmed, but Thomas Jefferson
Speaker 1: may have interacted with Parmentier been so inspired that he
Speaker 1: brought back the idea for what we call the French
Speaker 1: fry with him to Monticello and served it later at
Speaker 1: a White House dinner. This comes to us from a
Speaker 1: cool book called Potato, A History of the Propitious Esculent
Speaker 1: by John Reader. Ben, do you have a preference for
Speaker 1: a potato preparation? It can be a fry, it can
Speaker 1: be a mash uh, you know, home hash brown. I'm
Speaker 1: just interested. I almost sent you guys this picture over
Speaker 1: the weekend. I don't know if you saw it, but
Speaker 1: I cooked one of my favorite new potato recipes. It's
Speaker 1: not it's new to me, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: It's the have you you've heard of fondant potatoes? Yes? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Is that like a scalop potato? Ben? Yeah, yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: with cream and garlic and butter and all that. Well,
Speaker 1: the way I do it without selling to Parmentier is
Speaker 1: just this recipe that it takes a little bit of time,
Speaker 1: but it is more than worth it. You can't you
Speaker 1: do a cast iron thing? You got some time t
Speaker 1: H y m E some butter. If you look at
Speaker 1: pictures of it, you'll see what I'm talking about. Oh
Speaker 1: I see now, they're almost like they look like a scalop.
Speaker 1: They almost look like a sea scalop because of these
Speaker 1: little like potato stacks. That looks amazing. Now I was
Speaker 1: thinking more of a scalop potato um, which is uh,
Speaker 1: I believe like inly sliced layers of potato layered with
Speaker 1: cream and butter and garlic, and uh, it's absolutely My
Speaker 1: mom makes it and made it for this Christmas in
Speaker 1: July situation. But mashed potatoes were one of the any
Speaker 1: of these could have potentially been on the table literally
Speaker 1: at one of these dinners, one of these potatoes centric
Speaker 1: multi course dinners. But mashed potatoes was obviously a hit
Speaker 1: and in a favorite and there they they persevere to
Speaker 1: this day as like a holiday staple. And I believe
Speaker 1: in the the art of cookery. There is an eighteenth
Speaker 1: century recipe book written by um the English author Hannah
Speaker 1: glass um. This is believed to be the first ever
Speaker 1: recipe for mashed potatoes, and really, honestly, outside of a
Speaker 1: couple of little editions, this is pretty much the way
Speaker 1: it's done today. Right then, Yeah, here's the idea. It's
Speaker 1: one of those things where the approach is kind of like,
Speaker 1: don't fix it if it's not broken. The art of
Speaker 1: cookery just says the following. Boil your potatoes, peel them,
Speaker 1: put them in a sauce pan, mash them well to
Speaker 1: two pounds of potatoes, put a pint of milk, a
Speaker 1: little salt, stir them well together, take care they don't
Speaker 1: stick to the bottom. Then take a quarter of a
Speaker 1: pound of butter, stir it in and serve it up.
Speaker 1: Pretty simple, right, Yeah. I would personally probably add some
Speaker 1: garlic to that, maybe a little heavy cream. I wouldn't
Speaker 1: peel them. I wouldn't peel them. I likes red potatoes.
Speaker 1: I like the skin on these red potatoes instead of
Speaker 1: those big baked potatoes that I think is the quintessential
Speaker 1: or rather baking potatoes that is the quintessential potato. I
Speaker 1: think that we would have been thinking of in this
Speaker 1: period as well. Right to a million percent, a million percent.
Speaker 1: So this these dinners become quite the sensation and so okay,
Speaker 1: Tier two of his three tiered plan as absolutely a success.
Speaker 1: I mean, Jefferson even ended up keeping a copy of
Speaker 1: that potato treatise in his presidential library at Monticello. He
Speaker 1: got he got compromised. Big potato got to a big
Speaker 1: potato got to him. And um even like royalty got
Speaker 1: in on the mix, like King Louis the sixteenth, I believe,
Speaker 1: uh and um Marie Antoinette um are believed to have
Speaker 1: used potato flowers, right, these beautiful purple potato flowers um
Speaker 1: as decorations for their clothes. Uh and like you know,
Speaker 1: like lapel pins and and hat adornaments or whatever. So
Speaker 1: now we're into phase three one and two smashing success.
Speaker 1: Where where are we going for phase three? Ah? Yes,
Speaker 1: this smashing or mashing success is only going to be
Speaker 1: You're welcome, audible grown from Max. We're doing this. We're
Speaker 1: doing this for you Max. So uh, this this stuff
Speaker 1: is all well and good for the upper classes, right,
Speaker 1: but if you want this to have a lasting impression,
Speaker 1: and from Parmentier's perspective, if you want it to be
Speaker 1: useful to people, then it has to be useful to
Speaker 1: the common people. Who was that band who had that
Speaker 1: song common people is starts to the pulp Yeah, holds up.
Speaker 1: So this guy is like, you know, potatoes need to
Speaker 1: be for the common people. Potatoes need to be something
Speaker 1: that common people do or eat. So all his publicity
Speaker 1: stunts aren't really getting the job done outside of the
Speaker 1: upper crust, right, the upper crust of the fry social class.
Speaker 1: So Parmentier tries something different, doesn't he know. He goes
Speaker 1: to the king and asked for a favor. He does. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he goes to the king, King Louis the sixteenth um
Speaker 1: and requests a plot of land, a tract of land
Speaker 1: at Sebelan uh and that is in seventeen one. And
Speaker 1: the King, you know, having already and impressed with the
Speaker 1: moxie of this uh, this pharmacists, of this pow this
Speaker 1: potato evangelists, grants him this plot of land, which Parmentier
Speaker 1: immediately turns into a potato patch. This is also this
Speaker 1: land is located on the western edge of the Paris
Speaker 1: metro area. I guess you could say, um. And then
Speaker 1: he hired all of these heavily armed guards to kind
Speaker 1: of make it a big, you know, sort of almost
Speaker 1: like theatrical show of how important these potatoes are. Um,
Speaker 1: and he thought that people would notice the guards and
Speaker 1: assume that potatoes were some sort of really hot new commodity.
Speaker 1: Uh and anything that's you know, being guarded so um assiduously.
Speaker 1: To to borrow one of your favorite words, Ben would
Speaker 1: be worth stealing. Right, Yeah, there it is. You create
Speaker 1: the buzz by sort of faking demand until you make it.
Speaker 1: You know, this is this is great, but there's even
Speaker 1: goes this conspiracy goes this step further. This is the
Speaker 1: coolest heist moment of the show. So imagine Noel Max
Speaker 1: Fellow ridiculous historians listening along at home. Imagine that we
Speaker 1: get together a hist crew. We're in France, and we
Speaker 1: say they're guarding something secret. We're gonna bust it and
Speaker 1: take it because we're the best thieves there are. And
Speaker 1: so we all have our you know, it's a highst movie.
Speaker 1: We all have our specialties. Noel, I know that you
Speaker 1: have a special um proclivity for being a bagman, right bagman? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm the bag man. So that's that's that's that's who
Speaker 1: I am. Um. I carry a bag typically every day,
Speaker 1: So that's why, So we won't spend too much time
Speaker 1: on everybody else's specialties. But our highst crew goes in
Speaker 1: and we pull off our heist. We discover the secret
Speaker 1: it's potatoes, and somehow, somehow we get away. Yeah, we
Speaker 1: didn't really train that much even for this. You know,
Speaker 1: we're not particularly adept heist people. You know, you don't
Speaker 1: even know what we're looking for. I don't even know
Speaker 1: what a bagman does. I just say on them batman
Speaker 1: because I like to carry a bag, and then people
Speaker 1: make fun of me and call it a man first.
Speaker 1: But I'm a batman, thank you very much. But yet
Speaker 1: we get in and out. It's almost like these guards
Speaker 1: are letting us get away with these potatoes. Why would
Speaker 1: they do that, though, Ben, Why would they do that
Speaker 1: because their boss told him too. You know how heist
Speaker 1: movies have the stereotypical twist right in the third act
Speaker 1: or whatever, this is the third act twist. Parmentier has
Speaker 1: set up this heavily guarded situation and then he's told
Speaker 1: the guards, look, if any thieves come by, let him
Speaker 1: get away with the potatoes. This has gotta be great
Speaker 1: for the potatoes reputation. Now, in my head, he's like
Speaker 1: a Hollywood producer and he's smoking a cigar. It's something
Speaker 1: he's like, there's gonna be great for the potatoes public image. Here. Look,
Speaker 1: if any if anybody comes up and they try to
Speaker 1: bribe you, uh, just give them some potatoes. Take the bribe,
Speaker 1: no matter how big it is, the out of how small,
Speaker 1: whatever they could. They don't have to be money. If
Speaker 1: they come up to you with like a shoe, a
Speaker 1: handful of dart, you'll give them up a potato. You
Speaker 1: gotta wonder did did they Did they fire some half
Speaker 1: asked warning shots like no, come back here you no, no,
Speaker 1: what do you do? Bring back that potato? No? Yeah,
Speaker 1: they had to have at least given put put up
Speaker 1: some sort of faux fight or else. I think the
Speaker 1: roosts would have been a little too transparent, right, a
Speaker 1: little too obvious. Right, You have to because you know
Speaker 1: these thieves have presumably worked on their idea. It feels
Speaker 1: kind of it's kind of a deflation, isn't it. If
Speaker 1: you feel like, guys, we have we have these matching
Speaker 1: dark outfits. We worked on our like silent hand signals,
Speaker 1: and you just let us in. At least give me
Speaker 1: a good beating or something like that, you know, and
Speaker 1: then let me go. But no, it's true, and this
Speaker 1: this this publicity stunt, even though isn't apparent to those
Speaker 1: involved that that's what it was. That is what it was,
Speaker 1: and it worked. By the way, there's a really really
Speaker 1: cool article in The Farmer's Almanac also about the strange
Speaker 1: history of potatoes and the man who made them popular
Speaker 1: by Amber canuckle Um. Really good stuff on the Farmer's
Speaker 1: Almanac dot com. Never really realized what a good resource
Speaker 1: that was, but check that one out for sure. So
Speaker 1: he really has single handedly with his three tier approach,
Speaker 1: changed the hearts and minds of the of both the
Speaker 1: gentry and the lower class uh in favor of the potato. Yeah, yep.
Speaker 1: And this potato effect turned out to be a very
Speaker 1: good thing for French agriculture. The potato fundamentally changed the
Speaker 1: productivity of these farms. It had more reliable yields than wheat,
Speaker 1: and you could grow it in the same fields that
Speaker 1: wheat grows in as long as the wheat crop was
Speaker 1: follow It was easy to grow in a lot of
Speaker 1: different varieties of soil. It was easy to farm. And
Speaker 1: this like other people saw what was happening. Other world
Speaker 1: leaders caught on pretty quick. Catherine the Great over in Russia,
Speaker 1: King Adolph over in Sweeten. They get on board the
Speaker 1: potato trade. And you'll read you'll read varying estimates, but
Speaker 1: one of the ones that I think is is the
Speaker 1: most optimistic comes. You know, it's quoted in this Atlas
Speaker 1: Obscura article, and they'll tell you that there are a
Speaker 1: couple of historians who believe that potatoes may have doubled
Speaker 1: Europe's food supply in terms of just pure calories, meaning
Speaker 1: that they would finally be able to break the cycle
Speaker 1: of famine. I'm interested now, I want to see what
Speaker 1: the calorie contents of a potato actually is, because that's
Speaker 1: a really good point. I mean, we know now, you know,
Speaker 1: potatoes are something to be avoided oftentimes because they're so carbi,
Speaker 1: you know, and they're so calorically dense. But back then,
Speaker 1: when food scarcity was much more of an issue, you
Speaker 1: wanted stuff that was calorically dense, that was really really important.
Speaker 1: So it looks like uh, one hundred and sixty three
Speaker 1: calories per a medium potato, which actually isn't that insane um,
Speaker 1: but again it is the carbs. It has thirty seven
Speaker 1: grams of carbohydrates, which is not necessarily directly related to
Speaker 1: two calories. But I don't know, I've always been a
Speaker 1: little bit too unclear as to how carbs work. While
Speaker 1: cutting out carbs is different than cutting calories. Yeah, well
Speaker 1: it's it's interesting because potatoes do have a lot of
Speaker 1: other stuff going on, you know, like it's it's not
Speaker 1: just carbs, right, They can be a nutritious food, but
Speaker 1: you know, yeah, right, Well, they also contain all the
Speaker 1: essential amino acids you need to build proteins. They are
Speaker 1: lacking some stuff like over time. If you it would
Speaker 1: offer what experts call uh complete protein if you hate
Speaker 1: over ten potatoes a day, which is a lot even
Speaker 1: for me, but you would get deficiencies in certain vitamins
Speaker 1: like vitamin B, twelve, vitamin A. People are built to
Speaker 1: have a slightly varied diet, right, That's just how they evolved.
Speaker 1: But still the potatoes solves a lot of problems, and
Speaker 1: it gets kind of a bad rap, like you said, Noel,
Speaker 1: with the with the anti carb crowd. You know, I know,
Speaker 1: we we might have some listeners right now who are
Speaker 1: mad at us a little bit because they're like, today's
Speaker 1: the day. Today is the day I am going to
Speaker 1: get fries. It's okay, We're with you. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: worth it. Everything in moderation will be okay. There's one
Speaker 1: big elephant in the room. There's a there's a big
Speaker 1: potato in the room that we have to address. Uh.
Speaker 1: Fellow fans of history, you'll realize that around the late
Speaker 1: seventeen hundreds there was some thing else happening in France,
Speaker 1: something equally revolutionary, well more revolutionary, because it's it's literally
Speaker 1: it's the French Revolution. Yeah. If you have the inspirational
Speaker 1: tones of the score of the original cast recording of
Speaker 1: Les Miserabla going in your mind, um, that's because we're
Speaker 1: talking about the French Revolution. Uh. And it was the
Speaker 1: French Revolution that potentially could have put a damper on
Speaker 1: Permanentier's potato revolution, you know, more important revolution, one would argue,
Speaker 1: sort of took precedent, but it didn't really last. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So this was all happening during the lead up to
Speaker 1: this tremendous upending of French civilization society. Famine was still everywhere.
Speaker 1: Potatoes were useful, as farmers all the Night points out
Speaker 1: to help combat starvation, especially in northern France in but
Speaker 1: of course people in other parts of France were still
Speaker 1: still thought potatoes were suss. As we would say nowadays.
Speaker 1: Parmentier when he published that paper we mentioned, it was
Speaker 1: ignored because this basically because this paper was published in
Speaker 1: seventeen eighty nine, right before the beginning of the revolution,
Speaker 1: and the king himself knew that Parmentier and potatoes got
Speaker 1: a bit of a raw deal there. The King eventually said,
Speaker 1: France will not forget you found food for the poor.
Speaker 1: And think about this. It was really unpopular during the
Speaker 1: French revolutional royalty, you know, it was really connected with royalty,
Speaker 1: right now, Parmentier. No, that's a really good point. We
Speaker 1: we we sort of, I don't want to, I hope
Speaker 1: we didn't sound like we were saying that this treatise
Speaker 1: immediately caused the potato to explode, as you know, he
Speaker 1: did that that bit with like the fake potato heist
Speaker 1: or whatever, and that did start to get folks interested
Speaker 1: on some level. But you're right, it was still so
Speaker 1: sated with the wealthy. I mean, after all, they were
Speaker 1: stealing potatoes from the wealthy rather than like cultivating themselves
Speaker 1: but the whole idea was that it would become this
Speaker 1: like staple food, and it did ultimately. It wasn't though,
Speaker 1: until sevent that potatoes really really did start to take
Speaker 1: off in France, and that was there was a really
Speaker 1: important moment in that year when Madam Mary Go published
Speaker 1: her Potato cookbook, and that then began to associate the
Speaker 1: potato as the food for the revolutionaries, because after all,
Speaker 1: Madam America was also associated with the French Revolution. The
Speaker 1: official title of her book was La Cuisine Republican or
Speaker 1: The Female Republican Cook, so very much promoting these potatoes
Speaker 1: as the food of the common people, but all so
Speaker 1: acknowledging that common people like variety as well. You don't
Speaker 1: just want to eat boiled potatoes every day. You want
Speaker 1: to cook it in a bunch of different ways. And
Speaker 1: that is one thing that makes the potato great is
Speaker 1: you really can cook it in lots of different ways.
Speaker 1: Boil and mash them, stick them in a stew, make
Speaker 1: them into a fam dance, you know, layer them with
Speaker 1: cream and butter and cheese, you know, I mean, there's
Speaker 1: so many ways you can do a potato. Shred them
Speaker 1: straight up, fry them twice, bake, put them around stuff,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Throw them in the air
Speaker 1: like confetti, little shreds hash brown and try to catch
Speaker 1: them in your mouth. I think that's more technique than
Speaker 1: a dish. But you see what we're saying. They're versatile definitely,
Speaker 1: and you know, if we're getting functional here for for
Speaker 1: a moment, I do want to say I learned recently.
Speaker 1: I have a mandolin. You know that you used to
Speaker 1: shred the potatoes to make. By the way, wash your
Speaker 1: hands on those. Use the little plastic nub that it
Speaker 1: comes with. Don't just think you can do it with
Speaker 1: your hand, because you will get slices on your hand.
Speaker 1: Those things are don't joke. Yeah, go more slowly than
Speaker 1: you think you should. Agreed, But here's the thing. When
Speaker 1: you're making hash browns, the key is to rinse the
Speaker 1: potato shrugs so you get that starch off and that's
Speaker 1: what causes them to fry up much more nice and
Speaker 1: cris believe. You can put them in a bowl of
Speaker 1: water twenty minutes or so. Yeah, it's perfect and you
Speaker 1: can see the water changed too, And then you squeeze
Speaker 1: them with like paper towels or something to get that
Speaker 1: excess of moisture out. Yeah, I haven't figured out what
Speaker 1: to do with the starch water, but I'm convinced I can.
Speaker 1: I can figure out something. It won't just be wastewater anyway.
Speaker 1: You're right, uh, and we you can tell we think
Speaker 1: a lot about potatoes because we're big fans. Also, the
Speaker 1: person you just mentioned, Madam Mary Go just to be
Speaker 1: completely clear, when we say that she's a Republican, we're
Speaker 1: talking about it in the French revolutionary Yeah, right, the
Speaker 1: republic very different thing than the way it would be
Speaker 1: used in the United States today. But after this becomes
Speaker 1: accepted as the food for the revolutionaries, by the next year,
Speaker 1: tons of people are growing potatoes because they're a quick,
Speaker 1: efficient way to feed the forces of the rebellion during
Speaker 1: long sieges. So in the end, Parmontier survives the revolution
Speaker 1: and he keeps his head, which not everybody does spoiler alert,
Speaker 1: and he is accepted back into society because he's thought
Speaker 1: of more's the potato guy. Then he is as a
Speaker 1: friend of the king. The revolutionaries also recognized his expertise
Speaker 1: and they thought, you know, this guy can feed a
Speaker 1: lot of people. He was right about potatoes. Let's just
Speaker 1: if we let him keep his head, let's see what
Speaker 1: else he comes up with. His job security increased during
Speaker 1: the rule of Napoleon because Napoleon was all about making
Speaker 1: France self sufficient during the war across Europe. By this point,
Speaker 1: Parmontier's work and had expanded past potato does He gets
Speaker 1: a lot of credit for potatoes today, and rightly so
Speaker 1: for popularizing them, But that wasn't all he was into.
Speaker 1: He was he wanted to know more about corn. He
Speaker 1: saw a lot of potential in beat sugar. I wanted
Speaker 1: to ask you, uh Nold Max beat sugar. Have you
Speaker 1: guys ever used that in anything? Is it a sweetener?
Speaker 1: You know? It feels like it might have been the
Speaker 1: B side if his if his food research were an album.
Speaker 1: I feel like beat sugar is like track number two
Speaker 1: or three on the B side. Oh yeah, you can
Speaker 1: get it like in in bags like you would sugar
Speaker 1: in the raw. It kind of looks like it's branded
Speaker 1: the same way, So you definitely could use beat sugar
Speaker 1: to sweeten things for baking. I do know that beats
Speaker 1: are part of the reason that like impossible burgers bleed
Speaker 1: quote unquote, that's true. So there's beat sugar in those
Speaker 1: as well, But no, I haven't messed with that. Although
Speaker 1: I'm a huge fan of beats, of roasting beats, and
Speaker 1: that's one thing I growing up only knew the slimy,
Speaker 1: gelatinous beats that's slid out of a kid, which is
Speaker 1: not what they are at all. And a nice roasted
Speaker 1: beat with some goat cheese and maybe some grilled pears
Speaker 1: or something like that over some rugula, that is what's up.
Speaker 1: Get some dried figs in there too, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. Class it up. Don't be afraid impress whoever
Speaker 1: you're dating. All I'm saying is anyone out there that
Speaker 1: thinks they think beats are gross, Try taking a golden
Speaker 1: beat and just drizzling it with literally you leave the
Speaker 1: skin on, drizzling with olive oil, little salt, wrap it
Speaker 1: in a tinfoil bacon in the oven at three fifty
Speaker 1: for like, I don't know, twenty minutes maybe, and then
Speaker 1: you just wipe the skin off with a paper towel
Speaker 1: or a kitchen rag and it just comes right off.
Speaker 1: And then you slice them, and I swear they're the
Speaker 1: most I don't know, how would you describe describe it
Speaker 1: as earthy, kind of grassy, but also sweets and um
Speaker 1: really really nice in us. Yeah, and you can do
Speaker 1: these in slices as well. Like roasted beats way to go.
Speaker 1: You can make that your own. I would say I
Speaker 1: typically do it for like thirty five minutes or so forty,
Speaker 1: just because I like him super crispy. Throw some time
Speaker 1: on there, you know what I mean. You can throw
Speaker 1: some uh a little bit of salt and pepper anyway, Yes,
Speaker 1: Parmentier was really into sugar. We think beats get a
Speaker 1: bad name. No, parsnips are pretty good too, although I
Speaker 1: don't think Parmentier worked with him. Parsnips have had a
Speaker 1: hard time with it. I've never cooked them. I've tried
Speaker 1: them a couple of times, and I've always found that
Speaker 1: I've undercooked them and that they're very tough, and I
Speaker 1: think you really have to get them just right. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a there's a way to roast them, but they
Speaker 1: can be they could be a little bit finicky. We
Speaker 1: can't wait to hear more of your specific food recipes
Speaker 1: from history. But like we said, Napoleon is digging Parmentier.
Speaker 1: He's like the Napoleon is thinking, all right, this guy
Speaker 1: more potato guy than he is a royalist, so he'll
Speaker 1: help us with this. He'll help us beat sugar and corn.
Speaker 1: In fact, Napoleon is enough of a fan of Parmentier
Speaker 1: that eventually he gives him the Legion of Hotter. That's
Speaker 1: sort of like the presidential Medal of Freedom or something. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's similar. The Legion of Honor is the highest
Speaker 1: order of merit you can get in France, whether you
Speaker 1: are military or a civilian. It was established in eighteen
Speaker 1: o two by Napoleon himself. Very cool. Well, I think,
Speaker 1: well deserved. I don't know, there's really nothing particularly problematic
Speaker 1: in this dude's story, right, which I thought was kind
Speaker 1: of interesting, because usually there's some agenda or like, even
Speaker 1: if something takes off, it's usually being done for some
Speaker 1: like weird nefarious purpose. But I think this guy just
Speaker 1: realized again he came from suffering this, This whole experience
Speaker 1: came from him being jailed, you know, or imprisoned by
Speaker 1: the Prussians during the war and him realizing that potatoes
Speaker 1: were getting a bad rap, and then he actually just
Speaker 1: really liked them. And if you read his letters and
Speaker 1: his writings about potatoes, you could really tell the guy
Speaker 1: just really liked the potato and wanted everyone else too
Speaker 1: as well, and saw the potential for it in a
Speaker 1: world where food wasn't for everybody, or at least abundance
Speaker 1: of food wasn't for everybody. You know, it was reserved
Speaker 1: for the upper classes. And I don't think he approved
Speaker 1: of approved of that. He wanted to, you know, have
Speaker 1: everyone be fed and believe that everyone deserves to have
Speaker 1: a full belly. So I think that's pretty awesome. Yeah, agreed.
Speaker 1: And you know, after he was granted this legion of honor,
Speaker 1: he passed away peacefully in eighteen thirteen. He was seventy
Speaker 1: six years old, buried in Paris, and if you go
Speaker 1: there even today, you will see that his plot, his
Speaker 1: grave is surrounded by potato plants, and some people when
Speaker 1: they go to visit, they leave potato on his grave
Speaker 1: as as a way of saying thank you. What I
Speaker 1: think is amazing about this is the more we looked
Speaker 1: into this, well, the more I was convinced this guy
Speaker 1: was like a earlier version of Norman Borlog. I had
Speaker 1: this series I did a while ago, years and years ago,
Speaker 1: animated series called Stuff of Genius, which was all about
Speaker 1: inventors and the inventions that change the world. And Norman
Speaker 1: Borlog is a guy who was like Parmon Tier. He
Speaker 1: was an agronomous and he is often called the father
Speaker 1: of the Green Revolution. He went on to save over
Speaker 1: like a billion people from starvation, and Parmentier was doing
Speaker 1: a very similar thing with the potato. He he has
Speaker 1: a legacy that remains with us today. There he's like,
Speaker 1: you know, I think it was Atlas Obscura that called
Speaker 1: him like the Johnny apple seed of the tato. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it's absolutely accurate. It was. It was that atics Obscure article. Uh, specifically,
Speaker 1: Jim Clark made that excellent comparison. I love that and
Speaker 1: it's totally true. Um. He is to this day remembered
Speaker 1: in you know, the culinary tradition of French cooking. There
Speaker 1: are quite a few dishes that are named after him.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite soups in the whole world potato
Speaker 1: and leek soup, a version of that called pottage Parmentier,
Speaker 1: which is exactly just that. You can find a recipe
Speaker 1: or pormontage partier on the Farmer's Almanac. Just look for
Speaker 1: potato leak soup recipe on the Farmer's Almanac and will
Speaker 1: give you a little bit of that history. Uh. There's
Speaker 1: also like a version of this served cold. It's called
Speaker 1: not not not for me, not into a cold soup.
Speaker 1: But you know, I'm not a not a gaspacho guy,
Speaker 1: but I love a good hot potato and leak soup.
Speaker 1: And there's another one um called hot cheese parmentier that's
Speaker 1: a lot like a shepherd's pie, you know, with like
Speaker 1: different ground beef and vegetables and corn and stuff of course,
Speaker 1: you know, topped with mashed potatoes and hopefully some nice
Speaker 1: um crisped cheese. And this this is where we find
Speaker 1: ourselves today. According to the United Nations, the potato has
Speaker 1: grown in virtually every country that can do so in
Speaker 1: some in some form or fashion and some scale. And
Speaker 1: that makes it the world's fourth most important food crop.
Speaker 1: So go you potato, and thay you Peru. Oh and
Speaker 1: speaking of Peru, ben I didn't realize the Peruvians also
Speaker 1: had like a method for freeze drying potatoes to keep
Speaker 1: themselves like in you know, in potatoes, in case there
Speaker 1: was a blight or a crop shortage. And those freeze
Speaker 1: dried potato flakes are kind of the like early version
Speaker 1: of what we know today is instant mashed potatoes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I remember reading that. That's pretty that's pretty amazing as well.
Speaker 1: And that just goes to show you how long or
Speaker 1: how long people in Prue had been working with this
Speaker 1: native produce. No, although I know what's the end of
Speaker 1: our story and this episode is has been going a
Speaker 1: little bit long, there is one last myth I believe
Speaker 1: we absolutely must bust or we must at least address,
Speaker 1: which is I. I went to Belgium a while back.
Speaker 1: You remember that I was. I was in Brussels for
Speaker 1: a minute, and one of the one of the things
Speaker 1: that my friends told me as we were landing on
Speaker 1: the plane is, you know, don't call them French fries.
Speaker 1: You can ask for palem free the fried potatoes, but
Speaker 1: do not call them French fries. Because you see, folks
Speaker 1: both France and Belgium claim to be the inventors of
Speaker 1: what we call French fries in the US and h
Speaker 1: people are still going back and forth because now it's
Speaker 1: become a matter of national pride. Just save fries. Just
Speaker 1: say palem free in France or in Belgium. Be very
Speaker 1: careful with it. Yeah, Fried's just really means like fries
Speaker 1: um and palem is the French word for potato, so
Speaker 1: it's true. Uh, And honestly, French fries it just sounds
Speaker 1: like a dumb American alliterative kind of like, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: way of referring to something because we don't feel like
Speaker 1: learning the language or what was that thing where people
Speaker 1: are like, oh, now, so lame. Also, I love the idea.
Speaker 1: U Um. I'd love to hear about the way American
Speaker 1: cuisine is depicted or the way US cuisine is depicted
Speaker 1: in other parts of the world. I was in a
Speaker 1: grocery store one time that had an American isle and
Speaker 1: it was just junk food and peanut butter and one
Speaker 1: like very sugary cereal. That's hilarious. That's almost like a
Speaker 1: disc isle. I love that, Yeah, decile. It was a
Speaker 1: distract from the grocery store. And I think we don't
Speaker 1: know it's probably from the movie pulp fiction, or probably
Speaker 1: possibly from from travels or whatever. But uh. In Belgium,
Speaker 1: they don't put ketchup on their French fries. It's all
Speaker 1: about mayonnaise. And I have adopted that and I think
Speaker 1: it's awesome. Um. But I know some people are very
Speaker 1: triggered by mayonnaise, but it's good fries and mayonnaise, quick good.
Speaker 1: You know what I'll do. It's terrible for your help,
Speaker 1: but no question. And cheese sauce. Yeah, I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: say no to it. Especially it was potato wedges at
Speaker 1: our local establishment. Dude, cheese dip and wedges at the
Speaker 1: Righteous Room is like the off menu, I them. It's
Speaker 1: like the secret menu at in an out burger. You
Speaker 1: gotta you gotta try if you come to if you
Speaker 1: come to our our our neighborhood. Highly recommend yes, yes,
Speaker 1: highly recommended. Uh. And thank you to Parmentier for popularizing
Speaker 1: the potato because you know, in my head that means
Speaker 1: that he is in some way responsible for all of
Speaker 1: the potato recipes that you're produced after that point, you know,
Speaker 1: So thank you Parmenter, the potato man. You know another
Speaker 1: thing I didn't think about. We may be alluded to
Speaker 1: it a little bit, but potatoes keep for quite a
Speaker 1: long time, just out, you know what I mean, like
Speaker 1: out in a bowl in a dish on your on
Speaker 1: your kitchen counter, before they start to get gross, or
Speaker 1: like grow the even when they do grow, those little
Speaker 1: eyes or those little tubers. They're still absolutely usable. I
Speaker 1: have some red potatoes that I've been meaning to cook
Speaker 1: that I think I'm gonna follow the lead of our
Speaker 1: of our subject today and uh and and freak you
Speaker 1: see up something for lunch. Because they're also very versatile
Speaker 1: and a good kind of base for using stuff in
Speaker 1: your fridge that maybe you need to use. Uh make
Speaker 1: a little uh, you know, like a little stir fry
Speaker 1: with some potatoes and some vegetables. Maybe add an egg
Speaker 1: in there, you know, I think I'm gonna I'm gonna
Speaker 1: do that. Yeah. Nice. Yeah, they're hardy to they're they're
Speaker 1: durable and tough to kill. In fact, during the Great Depression, Uh,
Speaker 1: some of my ancestors were able to survive because they
Speaker 1: found a frozen potato patch. Which is a strange and
Speaker 1: inspiring of tragic story. But let's not end on a
Speaker 1: note like that. Off air ridiculous historians. Noel uh and
Speaker 1: Max and I were talking and Max, there's something that
Speaker 1: you've had on your mind since we've started this episode.
Speaker 1: Is that true? That is correct? There was this map
Speaker 1: that came out you guys know those maps that it's
Speaker 1: like the most googled blank by state and stuff like that.
Speaker 1: So there's this one from Zippia. Zippia, I've never used
Speaker 1: the website for. It's a job recruiting website called what
Speaker 1: job each state Google's more than any other, and it
Speaker 1: is one of the most enjoyable maps I've ever read
Speaker 1: in my entire life. So, like, a few of them
Speaker 1: are pretty normal, like Wisconsin is beer brewer, Minnesota's lumberjack,
Speaker 1: and Nevada is bus driver. Okay, but some of them
Speaker 1: get a little strange. So California is lion tamer um,
Speaker 1: New York is professional cuddler, and my personal favorite word
Speaker 1: one North Carolina is pirate. Wow. Okay, yes, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: These are aspirational jobs. These are just what job each
Speaker 1: state Google's more than any other of this. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: I could argue you could argue aspirational jobs, right, But
Speaker 1: the reason why I actually no, I want to keep
Speaker 1: that because the reason I bring this up is we
Speaker 1: gotta go to America's frozen wetland, which is of course Ohio,
Speaker 1: which if you've ever been to that state, you will
Speaker 1: understand why I say that their number one on most
Speaker 1: Google job is just potato. That's what aspirational. Indeed, so
Speaker 1: I think that's what Noel Gallagher called his brother Liam.
Speaker 1: I believe you called him a potato, which is also
Speaker 1: a very underappreciated emoji. Just a potato, you know, A
Speaker 1: big fan. I also love if we're talking British insults. First,
Speaker 1: well done, Max, thank you for that. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: going to be bothered by that for a while. But
Speaker 1: for British insults, which always impressed me. I was hanging
Speaker 1: out in pont City Market pre pandemic, which is where
Speaker 1: our office is based in Atlanta, Georgia, and I heard
Speaker 1: a British person called someone else a shape as an
Speaker 1: insult s h ape. They said, you've been shape, which
Speaker 1: is like good, good insult for reasons I don't understand,
Speaker 1: and I think you need the accent to pull it off.
Speaker 1: Did you know that the if I'm not mistaken, Michael Myers,
Speaker 1: the character in the Halloween movies, is referred to you
Speaker 1: as the shape. I wish I had learned more about
Speaker 1: the context of that situation. It's just hard to stop
Speaker 1: people and say, like, excuse me, sir, I am not British,
Speaker 1: but I do respect the insults employed by your culture.
Speaker 1: Last thing, another British chism with shape is an expression
Speaker 1: for dancing is throwing shapes. So I would I would
Speaker 1: say in that context. You know, like I said, it's
Speaker 1: tough to go in there and say like, excuse me,
Speaker 1: I'm not British, I know what's going on. But I'd
Speaker 1: love to learn a little more about this context because
Speaker 1: I want to see if I can pull off shape
Speaker 1: as an insult. So what is your deal, sir? Uh?
Speaker 1: You know what? Before yeah, before we go, I do
Speaker 1: have to ask Max, what is the job people are
Speaker 1: googling the most in Georgia. I'm glad you're asked, because
Speaker 1: if you live in Atlanta, this makes sense. It is tripper. Wow.
Speaker 1: Did not see that coming. Neither did I, but it should.
Speaker 1: It tracts if anyone's interested in some more like Atlanta
Speaker 1: centric kind of jokes and memes. There's a couple of
Speaker 1: really good Instagram accounts. I believe one is just called
Speaker 1: Atlanta Memes or something like that. Um, you can meme
Speaker 1: like a local, you can't. Yeah, it didn't see it
Speaker 1: come in the way. France didn't see the potato on
Speaker 1: the way. But that's how history works. Uh, No, thank
Speaker 1: you for this. What what a cool ride. Any any
Speaker 1: excuse to talk about food is a good episode for me.
Speaker 1: I'd love to hear everybody's epic potato related recipes or moments. Uh.
Speaker 1: And thank you, of course to the one and only
Speaker 1: Max Williams. Ben. Are those potato fondas are they just
Speaker 1: like like cookie cutter like cut out like a scallop?
Speaker 1: Or are they layered? Because I'm looking at the pictures
Speaker 1: of them? Yeah? Yeah, So what you what I like
Speaker 1: to do is take a take a pretty good medium
Speaker 1: sized potato, You peel it, you chop the the ends off,
Speaker 1: and then you usually if it's a medium potato, you
Speaker 1: can get about two of lenders out of it. So
Speaker 1: you cut that in half, and then you take whichever
Speaker 1: half is the most even it's usually where you made
Speaker 1: the cut in the middle, uh, and then you just
Speaker 1: you PLoP them down with some uh with oil. Initially
Speaker 1: get us a cast iron pan, and you finish them
Speaker 1: in the oven. So it's a whole thing. But if
Speaker 1: you want like eight of those little cylinders, just get
Speaker 1: four potatoes. Got it? Got it? And like Ben said,
Speaker 1: let us know your favorite potato recipes. We're still working
Speaker 1: on getting that sort of down. You don't think it'd
Speaker 1: be that difficult, but I promise it'll happen. I'm in
Speaker 1: the meantime, Please reach out to us as individuals on Instagram.
Speaker 1: I am at how Now Noel Brown, and you can
Speaker 1: find me on Instagram. In a burst of creativity, I've
Speaker 1: named myself at Ben Bull and you can also find
Speaker 1: our super producer Max Williams at Potato Fan and Holy
Speaker 1: Cow Ban. You just send a test the email to
Speaker 1: ridiculous at I heart media dot com and it appears
Speaker 1: to have worked. Well, that's good news. Uh, maybe maybe
Speaker 1: I'll get it as well. Well, we'll see, We'll see,
Speaker 1: but it does look like our email addresses up and running.
Speaker 1: Thanks of course to Casey Pegram. Thanks to Alex Williams,
Speaker 1: who composed this banging track it's probably playing lightly right now, definitely,
Speaker 1: And thanks to you Ben, and thanks to you Noel.
Speaker 1: Thanks to one of our favorite potatoes, Jonathan Strickland ak
Speaker 1: the question. We'll see you next time, folks. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts for my Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.