By Atty. Antonio P. Pekas
The person might have considered the entry in the menu exotic. French Fries. His curiosity got doused when the food came. “Patatas met lang gayam.” In Tagalog, “patatas lang pala.” The “lang” expressed how lowly we look at potatoes as food. This is due to its being so common and its having been around since we could remember.
Then I also got surprised when the French Fries of a friend I was meeting in a resto were served. These were not peeled. But the taste was not bad. I said, here we are eating unpeeled potatoes. Had we known long ago when I was still a kid, I would have been spared the almost daily chore of peeling potatoes whenever cooking time came. Being not well off that we were, even now actually, the cheap lowly potato and sayote were some of our regular staple. Looking back, that must have been a blessing in disguise.
As everybody else might have done, I Googled the matter when I got back to the office. Lo and behold. Potato peelings are a treasure trove of valuable nutrients. These include vitamin C, potassium, vitamin B6 and trace amounts of thiamin, riboflavin, folate, niacin, magnesium, phosphorus, iron, and zinc. As to medicinal value, here are some of what came out. It has anti-oxidants, a good source of fiber, protects against cancer, boosts immunity, lowers blood cholesterol, lowers risk of heart disease, maintains blood sugar levels, and a lot more.
Then I forgot the whole thing until a friend who is a licensed alternative medicine practitioner related how one of his cancer patients miraculously got well from colon cancer by eating potato peelings. Really? Yes, he vouched for it.
Since that time, aside from preaching the dietary value of unpeeled potatoes, he made it a regular practice every weekend to go and buy small potatoes vendors call marbles due to their teeny-weeny sizes. These offered more skin than the bigger ones which are sought after for baked potato dishes. He said, I would tooth-brush the marbles until they become meticulously clean then boil these.
And, so I also became a fan of marbles. Every now and then I would pick them up at the market along with tofu. Am sure chefs can come up with a number of tasty dishes from these.
How about the ordinary French Fries that are popular in fast food chains? They are bad for you. These are full of trans fats which can cause cancer, heart disease, high cholesterol, obesity, diabetes, etc.
But we cannot stop people from patronizing fast foods. These are a well-entrenched economic force you can only go against at your own peril. Considering that, why can’t we produce the potatoes they need. Their potatoes for fries and hash browns are coming all the way from North America or Europe.
As I heard, the common potatoes around have high moisture content thus unsuitable for French Fries and hash browns. But an agricultural expert once told me we can raise the varieties with low moisture content for these fast food products. So why is that not being done? Is it due again to the incompetence or lack of initiative of our bureaucrats who should be looking for ways to improve our vegetable farmers’ lot?
Anyway, the next time you are craving for French Fries, why not go to a resto serving these with the skin. It is hard to find one though in town. I only know one. So better prepare your own.**
