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The Ubiquitous #Potato


The other day, someone had posted an innocuous question on the social media: “What’s wrong with Bongs, why potatoes in Chicken or Mutton ?”

Sharing this in our evening ‘adda’ (participants in an  adda love to believe it to be an intellectual conversation or debate but it’s usually a group of people sharing gossip or nonsense); I  wondered aloud if there’s any recipe in the Bengali cookbook that ignores the potato?

“It’s only the so-called ‘Bengali Biriyani’ that includes a full round potato – whether vegetarian or non-vegetarian! And when in Kolkata, I ask for two of them in a plateful of Biriyani!” I added. “No other Biriyani includes this tuber…”

Daju did a “Tch!” for emphasis, and said gravely: “So you don’t know how British merchants pushed potato in the eastern parts of India?”

“Of course I do… I know representatives of the East India Company introduced potato and tea to Bengal…”

This time he repeated the unsavoury “Tch!” a number of times. “I said pushed, not introduced! The Portuguese had already introduced potato in western India. It was called ‘batata’! Some say that’s where the name potato evolved from.

“Anyway, many in the then East India Company believed that potato wasn’t getting popular in India since it was being grown in somewhat arid areas and even failed to survive. Thus, they started pushing the tuber in east. It is believed that potato seed was also used to bribe farmers!

“They even thought that potato will replace rice one day!”

“Now, that’s too far-fetched,” Sanjay interjected.

Daju ignored him: “By the 18th Century, potato caught up with the imagination of the Indian farmers and consumers alike but never replaced rice.

“Mashed, boiled, fried… mixed with other vegetables… put in fish, chicken, mutton gravies… It added a distinct taste and also helped increase the volume…

“Potato also entered the samosa (called singhara in eastern India), dosa and the likes elsewhere...”

I kept my ground: “But why Bengalis kind of over-use potato?”

Daju looked at me, sighed,: “Coz the British popularized it to that extent!”

"Daju is like the potato... he fits into any place...," quipped Kumar. I ignored the uproar that followed as there was an idea forming in my head... an idea of what to post as an answer to the question I started this musing with.

It may all likely be Daju’s personal opinion since I didn’t try to get into any extensive research after I had posted my answer on social media, but tell me how many of you, my friends, have potato and in what form... mention it in the comments section please…

(This post is the musings of Jayanta Bhattacharya. It has nothing to do with where he works or what he does to earn his bread. In case of any criticism or suggestion, write to @Jayantab15 on Twitter / Facebook or jayantab15@gmail.com on email)

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