Idaho Potato Faux Pas

When the parental units told my siblings and I that we were moving to Idaho, I was only ten, and got Idaho confused with Iowa. Since that wasn't too far away from Pennsylvania where we lived, I told the friends I was leaving that we'd see them every now and then.

Just about the time we hit Illinois by car, it began to dawn on me that Idaho was a ways away.

Lots of things about the state I didn't have a heads up on. I envisioned everyone with horses in their back forties, living on ranch/farms. I found that it wasn't as rural as I'd expected, although our next-door-neighbors who lived in town did have a dry farm for potatoes up in the hills.

What I really would've appreciated a heads-up on was the fact that potatoes were really BIG in Idaho. People grew them, they ate them, they had them on their license plates. I was only ten and unaware, and no one sat me down for the Potato Talk.

Which is why the major social faux pas occurred.

Our new Idahoan neighbors invited us to dinner at their home. I had no idea what was cooking in the kitchen when we walked through the door, but it smelled delicious. While the woman of the home was bustling over last minute preparations for our meal, the man of the house made conversation with us in the living room. He asked each one of us a question. The one he sent my way was, "So, do you like potatoes?"

At ten, I was no less painfully honest than I am now. I thought about it for a half second, recalling my experience with potatoes in the past. My mother, who, bless her heart, was an uncreative cook, had often boiled potatoes until they were a colorless gray and covered them with a bland, saltless gravy. The texture all-round was actually pretty gross.

"No," I answered, "Not very much."

Insert here an image of the clock on the wall stopping, and several adult mouths falling open. In one fell swoop, I'd not only just insulted the cook (who had made us baked potatoes with an array of toppings to choose from, expecting to delight us with our very first introduction to Idaho potatoes), the man of the house (a potato farmer), and virtually the entire state, who took tremendous pride in their product.

Oops.

Decades later, negative memories of watery gray blobs with flavorless gravy are long gone. Nowadays, I do like potatoes. Famous Idaho potatoes (refer to some of our vintage license plates), I've learned, are best baked, broiled or fried (my preference). The perfect potato is all in the preparation.





 *For more adventures in Idaho, (with recipes between the stories!) get the "Appetite for Idaho" book here.

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