Dehydrated Potatoes: an 800 Year Old Story---Chuño to Instant Mashies

Processing potatoes for storage has a long history; the Incas used climate to produce the first dehydrated potatoes. The process entailed an overnight freezing and thawing cycle plus low humidity. The ice crystals that formed forced openings in the cell tissue allowing for liquid to escape. The Incas employed foot power to expel the liquid. The cycle was repeated several times to lower the moisture content and then the marble-sized potatoes were dried for storage. The Incas called it Chuno, and it was a staple used by soldiers; sufficient quantities were dehydrated as well to guard against shortages.
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• The Process of Making ...
In the early 1950s, the U.S. had a surplus of potatoes.Improved disease resistant seed potatoes, crop protection chemicals, efficient equipment and improved storage technology had allowed potato farmers in the U.S. and Canada to grow more and at a faster rate than they could sell.
In the summer of 1953 research began on the potato flake process at the Eastern Regional Research Center. This facility was particularly interested in finding in new methods for processing potatoes that would allow for the use of potatoes with a relatively low solid content, varieties of which were common in the eastern United States. Previously, Idaho Russet Burbanks were used commercially in making dehydrated mashed potatoes because of their high solid content, necessary to obtain good texture when reconstituted. Teams of chemists, food technologists and engineers worked for a decade in the late 1950s to develop large scale potato dehydrating process to create instant mashed potato flakes for use in new commercial products such as Pringles' potato crisps, as well as, portable, non-perishable potatoes for hunger relief programs.
In 1954, the Eisenhower administration saw an opportunity to put these potato and other farm surpluses towards efforts to rebuild food systems and combat hunger abroad after the war. His administration passed a series of policies that included granting U.S. grown commodities as humanitarian aid, known as the Food for Peace Act. This program took food grown in the U.S. and delivered it abroad to people in need.
Today, the Food for Peace program is America’s longest standing permanent program for providing international food aid. Through Food for Peace, the U.S. consistently allocates resources to respond to hunger emergencies around the world every year.
In 1960, with the urging of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the U.N. General Assembly officially established the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) a multilateral food aid program with a fund of $100 million in food and cash on a three-year experimental basis.
The U.N. World Food Programme has had many leaders since its inception in 1961. In 1992, Catherine Bertini was the first American to serve as Executive Director of the global organization, and also the first woman to lead a United Nations agency.
Today, the U.N. World Food Programme is one of the world’s largest hunger-fighting organizations with a presence in 120 countries and territories. It reaches over 150 million people every year with lifesaving food assistance.
On November 3, 1961 Kennedy created the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to lead the U.S. government’s international development and humanitarian efforts becoming less of a means of distributing surplus food, and more of a strategic tool to address hunger. And advance US interests around the world during the Cold War.
WFP operations in Gaza include food parcels and flour to families in shelters, hot meals, support to bakeries, special nutritional products for mothers and small children, and nutritional snacks for children in special safe areas set up by UNICEF.
For the first time last week, WFP-supported community kitchens in northern Gaza are providing hot meals with fresh vegetables (potatoes and onions). This first delivery is part of WFP’s efforts to bring in nutritious fresh produce to supplement the emergency food rations that families have survived on for months and stave off malnutrition.

[@rubyquail]

So interesting!