Winter - Classical MileEnd Alpacas

" … the region is home to some three thousand
varieties of indigenous potatoes. Some of the
native strains look pretty strange as they are
brightly coloured inside and out and come
in all sorts of odd shapes. Many are disease
resistant and were selected by the pre-Inca
peoples for their good taste and high culinary
qualities."
over 1000 samples of wild potato collected
by the British Empire Potato Collecting
Expedition in 1938. From Lima, the party
journeyed 9000 miles through Peru, Bolivia,
Argentina, Ecuador and Colombia, ending in
Panama eight months later.
One of the members of that team was the
late Professor Jack Hawkes who played an
important international role in the emerging
discipline of plant genetic conservation. It was
recognised that plant genetic resources and
potentially important genes were rapidly being
lost in many parts of the world. Today crop
germplasm is kept in gene banks across the
globe which contributes to the sustainability
of the world's food supply.
The potato was probably domesticated
between seven and ten thousand years ago in
the Lake Titicaca region and the varieties were
particularly suited to the quechua or 'valley'
zone at altitudes of 3100 to 3500 metres. A
frost resistant species was also developed that
grew in the puna at around 4300 metres.
The Huari civilisation in the Ayacucho basin
and the Tiahuanacu near Lake Titicaca, had
sophisticated irrigation, terraced fields and
raised field technology which resulted in yields
estimated at ten tonnes per hectare.
It was the 'people's food' and played a
central part with time being measured by how
long it took to cook a pot of potatoes and land
measured by topo, the area a family needed to
grow its potato supply.
The Andean peoples stored potatoes in
fresh and processed forms. Inca archaeological
sites reveal extensive storage systems where
temperature, moisture and diffused light were
carefully managed to reduce spoilage. They
also made chuno which was light, lasted for
years and could be traded. The tubers were
frozen at night, then warmed in the sun but
shielded from direct rays, trampled to slough
off the skins and soaked in cold running water
for one to three weeks. Next the product was
removed to the fields and sun dried for five to
ten days. As the tubers dry they form a white
crust, hence 'white chuno'.
The first potatoes to reach Europe arrived
in Spain around 1570, unfortunately Sir
Francis Drake did not get there first. They
were viewed with suspicion and were
rumoured to cause wind and leprosy and
incite sexual desire and were given names like
'earth's testicles' and 'Eve's apple'. It wasn't
until the eighteenth century that the potato as
a food crop in Europe began to take off and
Henry Hobhouse was among the historians
who believed that the potato encouraged the
rapid rise in population that brought about
the Industrial Revolution. The famines,
harsh winters and wars in Europe during that
century hastened the popularity of potatoes
as they grew well and could be stored in the
ground where they were less likely to be stolen
by hostile armies.
'Late blight', phytophthora infestans, first
appeared in the Low Countries in 1845
spreading to England and then to Ireland
where the poor farming population had no
alternative foods to fall back on. The British
government largely ignored the emergency
and by the end of 1848 a million and a half
Irish people had either died or emigrated.
Even though the potato was seen as the
cause of the Irish famine, it has in general
prevented famine with its high yields, brought
about increased population growth and is now
grown world wide. It allows even the poorest
farmers to produce more healthy food with
little investment or hard labour. Even children
can easily plant, harvest and cook potatoes.
Paradoxically the potato as an anti famine
food has today, in our obesity obsessed age,
been transformed from a simple source of
carbohydrate, protein and vitamins into a
relatively expensive processed food carrying
large amounts of fat known internationally as
fries or if you are English – chips.
Alpaca World Magazine Winter 2007 / 08
55