Tuber

I live in a quiet mature rural neighborhood. Most of the folks have been my friends for over thirty years. One special family farms most of the surrounding fields including one adjoining our property. They are not only great folks but raise some of the freshest most succulent summer vegetables I’ve ever eaten. They’re out picking well before the blazing sun charges over the eastern horizon to burn off the morning dew. My diet consists of a lot of whatever they grow and harvest. Luscious zucchinis, tomatoes, and beautiful green, red, and yellow peppers all are seasonal culinary delights that I anticipate in just a few more months.
However, there is one of their vegetables that I savor the most and year round, too -the potato. Although I love rice, one of the things I missed the most in India was potatoes. I didn’t realize just how much potatoes were a staple in my diet and heritage. I’ve purchased hundreds of cases of eighty and hundred-count potatoes during my years in the restaurant business and ate quite a few of them too. The potatoes that I eat now are special huge “chef”-sized potatoes grown by my farming friends in our own neighborhood. What a treat and what a bargain at cents per pound instead of dollars like everything else now days. No potatoes are wasted, even the tiny ones. They are actually put into cricket shipments (yes, the chirping kind) being shipped all over the United States to provide food and moisture while in transit.
The potato growing process is fascinating especially when I can watch it up close and personal. In the past, I’ve actually been part of the process for a very short time before I discovered that the first requirement is a strong back. I’ll never forget standing on the platform of a bouncing, massive potato-digging machine trying to separate unbelievable amounts of masquerading rocks from the actual potatoes. (In addition to my sore back, I lacked co-ordination.) In fact, every part of the potato growing process involves a lot of physical work but my farming friends seem to be one of the happiest and most content families that I know.
Potato plants are robust dark green plants. They eventually flower and then are killed just before the potatoes are harvested. To my knowledge there is no use for the acres of potato plants. They live to die and shrivel up to a dull brown color. The value isn’t in the lush green plants but in the tubers growing on the roots hidden under the soil. In fact unlike most plants, next year’s crop comes from planting pieces of last year’s potato harvest not the seeds of the flowers. Perhaps you have seen the shoots coming from potatoes that you’ve stored for a while at room temperature. They’re actually attempting to start a new crop now that they detected warmth.
I am always amazed at the hundreds of thousands of potatoes in my neighbor’s modern insulated cool climate-controlled barn. There are still many old underground potato storage barns in my area but most aren’t used. Whenever I see them though I am reminded of many things I’ve learned from the humble, often maligned, tubers called potatoes. Perhaps one of the greatest is to look for hidden sustenance tucked away out of sight and to resist always over-valuing lush visible growth. What do potatoes speak to you?