Fun Fact and Trivia
- The potato is about 80 percent water and 20 percent solids.
- The world's largest potato chip was produced by the Pringle's Company in Jackson, TN in 1990. It measured 23' X 14.5'
- An 8-ounce baked or boiled potato has only about 150 calories.
- Potatoes grow underground, but are actually swollen stems, not roots.
- The average American eats about 126 pounds of potatoes per year while Germans eat about twice as much.
- In 1974, an Englishman named Eric Jenkins grew 370 pounds of potatoes from one plant.
- Thomas Jefferson gets the credit for introducing 'French fries' to America when he served them at a White House dinner.
- The potato belongs to the family Solanaceae, and is known to scientists as Solanum tuberosum; all the plants in this family share certain characteristics, like having similar leaves and flowers. Other members of the family are the tomato, pepper (green, chili, jalapeno, etc.), eggplant, nightshade, belladonna, petunia, and tobacco. Some parts of these plants are very poisonous.
- Potatoes vs. sweet potatoes: The sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) belongs in the same family as the morning glory and is not a relative of the potato. The Spanish who brought sweet potatoes back from the West Indies called them by their native name batatas. When white potatoes (papas) were introduced into Spain some years later, some people thought they were related. Soon papas were renamed patatas, but both were translated into the English as potato.
- The potato skin changes its chemical structure after it is harvested. The outer layers thicken and harden, and their cells are converted to the same substance that is found in bottle cork.
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