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Boiled Potatoes (Without doubt better than)

without doubt better than those that are pared. The saline constituents of the potato are potash, and when potatoes are pared a large percentage of these salts, which are freely soluble in water, are drawn out into the water, and the potato has rather a flat taste. This also contradicts the idea of a simple paring around the potato. The salts dissolve out if the skin is broken.

The temperature of boiling water is 212° Fahrenheit under ordinary atmospheric pressure. If the water boils slowly the potatoes will cook just as quickly as though it were boiling at a gallop; and the outside will not be boiled soft and to pieces while the inside is under done. Where the potatoes are large, the boiling may be checked for a moment just before the potatoes are done, and the inside then will be soft as well as the outside.

Potatoes require to be cooked to render them palatable and digestible. This cooking may be either by boiling, baking, steaming or frying, but frying potatoes is the most indigestible way of cooking them. Potatoes that have been once boiled and then fried, unless they are fried carefully in butter, are the most unwholesome and indigestible of foods. Boiled potatoes are almost as difficult of digestion. Steaming is perhaps a better method of cooking than boiling, but baking is better than either of the above methods. Young potatoes, which may be in the early spring more tempting than old ones, are by far more indigestible.