A Brief History of the Spud

Here at Boxerchips we only choose the best spuds from local British farmers, but its only recently (in historical terms) that this vegetable has been cultivated on these fine shores.

Brought to Europe from the New World by Spanish explorers in the 1500s, today the potato is the fifth most widely grown crop worldwide. The crop’s success was never a foregone conclusion, however, in the 18th century the tuber was a startling novelty, frightening to some, bewildering to others—it even sparked new fashions across the continent.

Blooming potato plants send up five-lobed flowers which scatter across the fields like colonies of purple starfish. According to some, Marie Antoinette liked the blossoms so much that she put them in her hair. Her husband, Louis XVI, put one in his buttonhole, inspiring a brief vogue in which the French aristocracy swanned around with potato plants on their clothes. The flowers were part of an attempt to persuade French farmers to plant and French diners to eat this strange new species of vegetable.

Compared to grain based crops (such as rice and wheat), potatoes are far more productive. Growing underground, the size of the crop is not limited by the rest of the plant – in 2008 for example, one shocked Lebanese farmer dug up a potato weighing almost 25lbs. This sacred vegetable was even heralded as the cure for famine across northern Europe. Indeed, a statue of Sir Francis Drake still stands in Offenburg, South West Germany, bearing the inscription

“disseminator of the potato in Europe
in the Year of Our Lord 1586.
Millions of people
who cultivate the earth
bless his immortal memory.”

We at Boxerchips bless his immortal memory too, for had he never bought the humble potato to our shores, you’d not be able to enjoy our deliciously wholesome handmade 100% British potato chips!

Find out more about the history of the potato here.

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