Wednesday, 16 April 2008

Exit rice, enter potato.

There's a good reason why this year is the international year of the potato, especially to us Mauritians. What with the super raise in the price of rice, we are compelled to adopt alternative eating habits and I must say that this is not such a bad thing. After all, cutting down our consumption of rice can only mean good to us, considering the alarming number of diabetes cases in the country.




Replacing rice by potato in a diet can have many advantages like combating obesity, keeping diabetes in control and improving the overall health of the population.

Of course, the way of cooking the potato matters; fried potato chips for dinner would not be really beneficial to the health. :D We'll now have to learn several derivations of the mashed potato recipe and I guess eating homemade stuff would be more appropriate from now on.

Initially it might be hard to give up on rice but in the long run you'll get used to it. It's a personal experience; I'm about to celebrate my third week without rice. Yayy!

Finally, if you see a future of potato-eating quite gloomy, there's still breads and our irreplaceable faratas.

Now let's just leave the rice for rare briyanis and fried rice and let's adopt the potato (not couch potato) attitude.
Aah! So long dudettes and dudes and my conscious aliens. I'm off to cook some potatoes.

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20 comments:

  1. I love potatoes. My mum made mash potato today. Looks like the rice era is soon over. I hope you cook mighty potatoes. :P

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  2. hihi... i'm trying to cook mighty potatoes :P

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  3. i ate mash potato!!!
    so does it mean i(i = my mum) will not be able to make salade de riz ek olives entier next time we have our food day?!
    lets all be potato!!! topato. tapoto. patoto.

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  4. naaaawww this is awful!
    think globally!
    think about the poor who are extremely dependent on rice. lately
    there have been riots in poor countries over the price of rice
    and people are even queuing up during the whole day to get their share of rice which happen to be their staple food. i think this shortage of rice is really bad and i read somewhere that 3 billion people depend on rice.
    just imagine the worldwide unrest that the shortage of rice heralds! :S

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  5. nice topic...Yes potato is one of the next best things. i think we will be developing newer mauritian recipes now or bringing back older ones. :)

    @ rooch I am sure everyone knows what is happening in other countries. but if we mauritians are able to get through with potato it is better. we cannot think globally when we have to strive to survive individually imho

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  6. Potatoes are our main source of food here. Rice though has become popular during the last decade as well, we mix more than we used to.
    You can do lots of things with potatoes. You can just cook them, with skin, or without (depends on the potato variety). You can roast them in the pan, makes them crispy on the outside, but you do have to cook them first as well to make the inside soft and eatable. You can mash them. You can fry them. Potatoes are richer in nutritions you need then rice, so they are indeed a good alternative to rice during these hungry days.
    Enjoy Columbus gift to the world (well he stole it from the native americans really).

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  7. potato :O
    lol
    it turned our whole political scenario once... jus be aware..its addictive ..thanks to ireland...:)

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  8. people has good imagination... year of potato... :D

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  9. Mash potatoes is my favorites but I still love those yellow rice and curry. Maybe dip those potatoes in curry will be great :)

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  10. keli, yup pou bizin fr bne lot recette aster :P

    rooch, yup i know in the world it's really a disaster but we mauritians got to adapt to at least save ourselves.

    nash-1, yeah it'll be interesting to develop new recipes. i'm looking forward to that

    manico, hihi yeah columbus made the vegetable known to us and revamped it a little :P

    daydreamer, the more addictive the better :P it'll help people move from rice

    ropi, yeah but it's meant seriously.

    fruity, yup it'll make a great recipe :P

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  11. eating potato is not too bad :)

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  12. hmmm...wel i wolud like to have chips for dinner too....lolz..but yeah have to keep off fried stuff or else they would kick us off the fotball team...

    nn well about rice...you should not have it before a important match...you camnt run as much if u eat rice.... i dnt know the exact bio reason..but its true...so one more up thing for potatoes

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  13. True! true! In Mauritius we eat way too much rice. Potatoes are really good indeed. And loads of recipes can be made with potatoes. Roasted, baked, warm salad, cold salads, mashded and seasoned. I love baby potatoes with the skin on seasoned with herbs and roasted in the oven.
    Potato wedges are also very nice.

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  14. Personally i think the whole thing rice is not very good for health is total B.S. I love eating rice, fried potatoes, meat & stuff considered not good for health. And I'm still going strong. All you just need is some physical work outs.

    Healthy food tastes like 'manzé ti baba' LOL

    The funniest thing is that many people who eat 'healthy' food & are constantly on diet are the ones who are ill or obese.

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  15. nice thread. but i wish to say something about what slasher said. you are still young to say you are going strong with what you eat.
    let's see if you can have the same response after 30 yrs.

    about ill and obese people, you should see it the other way round. those ppl were eating anything at first which resulted in illness and obesity then they are forced to adopt a healthy diet.

    i agree with lovliebutterfly there are many many recipes that can be made with potato. we are witnessing the food revolution in mauritius.

    i heard on the radio that planters are now increasing potato cultivation to meet the demand.

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  16. Potato is good! I love it in salads, roasted with herbs, baked with just a teeny weeny amount of cream and once in a while as wedges or fries :D

    Like you say, it's just a matter of how to cook and accommodate the potatoes.

    *cheer for potatoes* Yayyyy

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  17. You're hilarioius. I love potatoes - especially the unhealthy variety. Sad, true.

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  18. You are tagged. Check out my "10 reasons why I blog" tag

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  19. hehe..we in india too loves rice....
    i guess gals stay away from it coz to maintain thier figure..lols....

    chips are great..but no long run...

    njoy ur potato morinn..

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  20. cook potatoes...but wch?? fried??or boiled??


    p.s. i updated

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