Hirai Farms in Moses Lake has donated 35,000 lbs of potatoes to Seattle-area food banks. The first 5,000 lbs is scheduled to arrive tomorrow at 11am at the White Center Food Bank with the rest going to the Kent warehouse of NW Harvest. To put this in perspective, according to White Center Food Bank director Rick Jump, a normal spud donation is usually around 500 lbs. Whereas normally a household will be offered two to three pounds of potatoes per visit, families will be offered 10 lb bags of potatoes through next week. Jump is confident that all 5,000 lbs will be gone by the end of Thanksgiving weekend.
To put this in perspective, a large russet potato (the type being donated), is just over half a pound. This means that each household, with an average of four to five members each, will be receiving approximately 15 potatoes! That’s enough to make this recipe, this one, this one, or this one two to three times over.
Potatoes are amazing. Nutrition.com doesn’t even have a section for the negative aspects of eating russet potatoes.
Is this…
the new face of Hirai Farms?
Got any good recipes for potatoes? Added bonus if all the ingredients can be found at the White Center Food Bank.
Potatoes are actually pretty nutritious (but you have to eat the skins). They are a good basis for any casserole, for various takes on au gratin, hash browns, boiled, baked, fried, mashed, sliced thick or thin as fries or chips. Seasoned mashed can be used as a spread on bread or crackers or as a crust for a pot pie, or the basis for scotch callops, then there’s pancakes and… The possibilities are truly endless.
Oh, Aaron. Why must you sully a generous donation by a local farm with a silly joke about a toy? Also, were food banks in dire need of potatoes? If not, why reference the Irish Potato Famine?
one stick of butter (salted). one hot potato. slice open. stick butter in.
eat with bare hands.
I use mashed potatoes as a crust for quiche or pot pie-type things all the time. Just press into the bottom of a pan, brush with olive oil, bake, then fill with whatever and bake again. It’s definitely healthier than regular crust.
That’s my only potato tip.
I used to make this when I was young and poor. I make a more lavish version now with sour cream and pancetta but the original was pretty good.
Food Bank Potato Chowder
4 large potatos diced
2 cans creamed corn
1 can carrots or 3 fresh diced if they have them
1 onion diced
chicken or vegetable stock or boullion cubes
and water to make 2 quarts
Two tablespoons oil
salt and pepper
Herbs, fresh or dried if you have some
3 strips bacon (optional)
Diced ham or grated cheese is great if available
In a soup pot:
If you have bacon chop and fry till crisp. Remove the bacon and saute the onions in the grease
or
Saute onions in the oil until lightly carmelized
Add liquid
Boil potatos and carrots in stock until so soft they begin to disintegrate.
Add the corn
Stir until potatoes are just lumps.
Add in the bacon, ham or cheese if you have any.
Add more liquid if needed.
Adjust seasoning with salt and pepper.
Garlic mashed potatoes with skins
1. Wash potatoes with soap or vegetable scrub. Remove eyes and bad spots.
2. Put potatoes in a big pot half full of water. Add one clove of garlic for every two potatoes.
3. Boil potatoes until tender all the way through.
4. Mash potatoes and garlic together (with the skins on).
5. Serve with butter. Add salt and pepper to taste.
This works for russet potatoes or red potatoes, although I prefer the latter. I fucking love red potatoes – boiled, fried, mashed, baked, raw, whatever. They’re amazing.
Microwave until tender. Slice thick pieces and fry in oil on both sides until brown. I like to sprinkle with herbs and garlic salt. Enjoy!
That is a fantastic donation, especially since in Seattle food donations are way down as a result of the economy, while need has gone way up. Way to go, Hirai!
The nutritional content of potato skins is a myth. The goods are inside; the skins are pretty much all wax. Tasty though.
potatoes have a high glycemic index. they convert to sugars really fast. you’re better off eating yams or sweet potatoes. if you must eat potatoes, eat the slower-digesting kind – yukons, blue incas. not russets.
i realize that poor folks don’t have that luxury. but for god’s sake, don’t fry them.
#10
Hoey
No wax, dirt
The good stuff is just inside the skin, the first 1/4 inch of the potato, thus, leave the skins if possible and eat them along with the fist 1/4 inch, yes.
I used to run a 700 acre potato farm in eastern Washington – big business – for real – the best Russets in the world – better than Idaho by far. Washington Russets are shipped to Idaho and then bagged as the
wonderful Idaho Potato – no shit.
Geo a clue you all – NO better food for the money. Even vitamin C and wonderful natural fiber. ALWAYS eat the skins.
Rinse well, brush or paper towel — never use soap.
Au gratin, baked with cheese and milk and egg – sublime
Soup of any kind, leek and potato, very French, for real
AND, the wonder of wonder, served at the RITZ in Paris – the croquette. These are perfectly seasoned mashed and shaped into 4 inch tubes, then dipped in egg and coated fine crumb breading and perfectly deep fried in peanut oil….so crisp on the outside so soft inside, bright golden brown only.
Beyond delicious. And world class fancy.
More later ( Just bake and salt and pepper and butter or sour cram or any cheese stuff or salsa and cheeses and maybe peanut butter …. smoked gouda grated with dash of pepper sauce …
pan fried with just some onion, any oil on hand, but, onion is great
I was always under the impression that the combination of potatoes (skin-on of course) plus milk was about as nutritionally complete as one could get with just two food sources.
The problem for a lot of people is that either they can’t handle lactose, or, as several have already suggested, they cut away the most nutritionally relevant part of the tuber before consuming it.
@10: Where do you get your information about potato skins? Most of the sources I can find online say that the flesh has the majority of the nutritional value, but flipping that around it means that the skins have a fair bit as well, and a great deal more relative to their volume.
Also, ignore what I said in #6 about the soap – scrub potatoes with your hands or a brush under running water, but don’t put soap or ‘vegetable cleanser’ on them. So say the FDA, EPA, and USDA: http://counties.cce.cornell.edu/onondaga…
I’m going to stick with Harold McGee, author of On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen on this one. If he says it’s wax, it’s wax. The skin has fiber in it, too, which is good, but it’s not nutritive. Delicious, though.
I dunno about the “quarter inch” theory. I suppose it’s possible.