🥔 What's the best thing to ever happen to the potato?
My son Eli recently started liking ketchup on his french fries. And if you know anything about kids, you know that a lot of times they don't like the stuff we think they should like.... like putting ketchup on their french fries.
So this was a good moment all around - but it's much, much bigger than the ketchup (of course).
It's much bigger than the ketchup because it was a reminder of how important it is to always know that good things in life can sometimes be made even better. A simple, yet vital, perspective.
Ex: The tomato was already good... then came the ketchup!
The potato was already good... then came the fries!
Then we put them TOGETHER... now they're both BETTER!
You see where I'm going here? So this is big shit for my boy Eli, but we're about to have some grown folk talk now. It's newsletter time.
I think we'd all agree that ketchup is the best thing to ever happen to the tomato. Right? But what about the potato? 🥔
What's the best thing to ever happen to the potato? (Yes, we're doing this)
Okay, well of course you could mash the damn thing 🥔 I guess that's gravy. I'm not opposed... but neither is your grandmother and her bingo friends. This ain't Pic-a-dilly, but do you bruh.
🥔 Also of note, you can bake it. You can always bake it! As long as you have some time and ingredients on your hands, you can bake it.
We're off to a pretty strong start, but are either of those two better than french fries? 🥔 I suppose it's arguable, but we've got a lot more work to do.
**Unless y'all actually want to argue (as some of you know very well, the replies to these email are open 📬)
Ok - you could eat a bag of chips (which just may be the best snack of all-time, IJS)! I'm talking both the kettle cooked AND the traditional type of chips 🥔 it do not matter, my man. Can't lose here, honestly.
Let's keep exploring 🧐
Oh look! The internet says you can make cheese curds!... and while I'm not entirely sure I know what those are... if you make 'em I'll try em 🤷🏽♂️
You could make hash browns (you damn sure can!), which if we're being honest is the biggest thing to hit the breakfast table since the hog itself. Ain't nothing ever been wrong with a hash brown 🥔
What do you think?
Also, you could make lil' potato soup 🥔 ... lil' bacon bits? ...lil' butter, lil' parsley for added effect? It may take you all winter to eat it, but I'm not mad at a lil' potato soup.
☝🏽Ok, I just found out that cheese curds are NOT potatoes. They're just used in poutine, a potato-forward dish, which I'll also try if you make it for me. Hit my line, Canada! 🍁
Hmm. Where were we?
You can make potato salad! But you could also (hear me out) just... NOT make potato salad, you know what I mean? 🤢
We could do some potato cakes 🥔
Actually, let me rephrase that you could do some potato cakes. Not me.
And, I'm obliged to remind you all that you can also eat some wedges.... or you and Colonel Sanders could go watch paint dry at your neighborhood KFC instead, because I mean.. c'mon bro. Wedges?!
Oh, I can't forget - you can get some onions and peppers and a little oil and some hot sauce and make breakfast potatoes and I'd bet you not ONE person would complain. Not a single person.
You feel me, home skillet? 🥔
The potato is truly something else, I tell ya. It's so versatile; so tasty, you honestly can't lose. But, there are no moral victories in potatoes, and so I'm afraid I need to actually answer my own question.
What's the best thing to ever happen to the potato?
(I've left the cat in he bag this long for dramatic effect)
It's tater tots.... that's the answer here. Tater Tots. They are to the potato what ketchup is to the tomato.
For Lack of a Wetter Bird, tater tots are the best thing to ever happen to the potato.
Believe that. And don't forget the ketchup, Eli. We're done here.
-Troy
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