Many researchers believe that the
potato’s arrival in northern Europe spelled an end to famine there. Corn,
another American crop, played a similar but smaller role in southern Europe.
More than that, as the historian William H. McNeill has argued, the potato led
to empire, “By feeding rapidly growing populations, permitted a handful of
European nations to assert dominion over most of the world between 1750 and
1950.” The potato, in other words, fueled the rise of the West.
Just as important, the European and North
American adoption of the potato set the template for modern agriculture the so
called agro industrial complex. Not only did the Columbian Exchange carry the
potato across the Atlantic, it also brought the world’s first intensive
fertilizer, Peruvian guano. And when potatoes fell to the attack of another
import, the Colorado potato beetle, panicked farmers turned to the first
artificial pesticide, a form of arsenic. Competition to produce ever more
potent arsenic blends launched the modern pesticide industry. In the 1940s and
1950s, improved crops, high intensity fertilizers and chemical pesticides
created the Green Revolution, the explosion of agricultural productivity that
transformed farms from Illinois to Indonesia and set off a political argument
about the food supply that grows more intense by the day.
Research Source: Smithsonian Online
Need
a change, try these cheesy mashed potatoes.
Cheesy
Mashed Potatoes
Copyrighted
2013, Christine’s Pantry. All rights reserved.
Ingredients:
3
large potatoes, peeled and chopped
3
tablespoons butter
milk,
1 tablespoon at a time, add more if desired
salt
and pepper, to taste
1/2
cup shredded cheddar cheese
Directions:
Cook
potatoes in salted water, until fork tender. Drain, and return to same pot. Add
butter, milk salt and pepper. Mash with a potato masher. Add milk, 1 tablespoon
at a time, until desired consistency. Stir in cheddar cheese. Enjoy!
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