Interesting and fun uses of potatoes

The Incas used to use potatoes for healing:

– Raw slices placed on broken bones to promote healing.
– Carried to prevent rheumatism
– Eaten with other foods to prevent indigestion.

Various folk remedies use potatoes to:

– Treat facial blemishes by washing you face daily with cool potato juice.
– Treat frostbite or sunburn by applying raw grated potato or potato juice to the affected area.
– Help a toothache by carrying a potato in your pocket.
– Ease a sore throat by putting a slice of baked potato in a stocking and tying it around your throat.
– Ease aches and pains by rubbing the affected area with the water potatoes have been boiled in.

Some of the most famous potato dishes we enjoy today were created by mistake Collinet, chef for French King Louis Phillipe (reign 1830-1848) unintentionally created soufflés (or puffed) potatoes by plunging already fried potatoes into extremely hot oil to reheat them when the King arrived late for dinner one night. To the chef’s surprise and the king’s delight, the potatoes puffed up like little balloons.

In 1853 railroad magnate Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt complained that his potatoes were cut too thick and sent them back to the kitchen at a fashionable resort in Saratoga Springs, NY. To spite his haughty guest, Chef George Crum sliced some potatoes paper thin, fried them in hot oil, salted and served them. To everyone’s surprise, Vanderbilt loved his “Saratoga Crunch Chips,” and potato chips have been popular ever since.

Source: Potatohelp.com