Episode Details

I’ve been doing a series about foods that built civilizations. In this episode, we are talking about the potato.

It is difficult to imagine that thousands of years ago, people constructed large buildings, managed rivers, built monuments, and created art. We have glimpses of these civilizations through stories, archaeology, and the structures they left behind, but much of their history has been lost. Imagine, we don’t even know where Cleopatra or Alexander the Great are buried, yet we know their stories.

As European powers conquered Indigenous peoples, their languages, cultures, and oral traditions were suppressed. When a language disappears, so are the stories preserved within it. Our clues come from archaeology when we uncover a monument, a building, or an ancient settlement.

In the Andes, the potatoes they cultivated were not the Russets, Yukon Golds, or fingerlings you find in the store today. Different colors, shapes, and textures. Adapted to survive the elevations, temperatures, and growing conditions.

Biodiversity protected their food supply against frost, disease, and changing environmental conditions. If one variety failed, another might survive. The ancient wisdom of diversity that Andean farmers developed over thousands of years was lost when the potato eventually reached Ireland.

Preserving Potatoes

They even developed a method to freeze-dry the crop. They exposed the potatoes to repeated cycles of freezing and thawing. Then they pressed them and allowed them to dry. The result was called chuño.

The freeze-dried potatoes could be stored for years. When rehydrated, they were used in soups and stews.

I wonder if they ever thought about freeze-drying the coffee berry. Perhaps there was an ancient people called the Sanka.

Tiwanaku: Farming at the top of the world

The civilization flourished for centuries before it declined around the end of the first millennium CE. Near Lake Titicaca, in what is now Bolivia, the Tiwanaku civilization developed an agricultural system that allowed people to grow food in one of the most challenging environments on Earth. This pre-Inca civilization had monumental stone buildings, elaborate sculpture, and an extensive network of agricultural settlements. Its buildings and agricultural remains are still there. These people had an advanced civilization before the Inca. It is amazing to think the Inca were not the first to build a sophisticated society in the Andes.

They developed raised agricultural fields, known today as waru waru. Water-filled channels surround these elevated planting beds. The channels helped moderate temperature fluctuations, reducing the risk of frost damage to crops, while the raised beds improved drainage and growing conditions.

The Inca: An empire built on agriculture

The Incas inherited thousands of years of agricultural knowledge

The empire depended on the ability of crops to grow at different elevations. Food was collected, stored, and distributed throughout their kingdom. Potatoes were important in the highlands, while maize, quinoa, and other plants supported populations in different environments.

Machu Picchu sits high in the Andes. Its buildings, terraces, and water systems demonstrate advanced engineering. It is on most travelers' bucket lists.

When the Spanish arrived, they encountered an unfamiliar vegetable, a product of thousands of years of agricultural experimentation. They would carry that vegetable across the Atlantic.

The Irish Lumper: The Potato That Fed a Nation

The most famous potato is the Irish Lumper. When the Lumper arrived in Ireland, it thrived, even in poor soil, and produced enough food to sustain a family on a small plot of land. The Irish Lumper was a large, knobby, rather homely potato with pale skin and yellowish flesh. It was