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Potato processing in the central highlands of Peru
Abstract
The processing of food products is an important economic activity of rural households in the Andean Highlands of Perú. Potatoes are processed into several dehydrated products the most common of which are chuño and papa seca. Chuño is a freezedried product made principally from bitter types of potatoes (Solarium juzepczukii and S. curtilobum) while papa seca is made from common varieties. This article describes how these and other products are made and their role within the Peruvian diet.
... Chuño blanco, or white freeze-dried potato (i.e., tunta), production is similar, but the potatoes are not dried in the sun and are additionally washed in freshwater, sometimes for several days or weeks. The freeze-drying process renders the small bitter tubers edible by removing toxic glycoalkaloids that are present in wild and semi-domesticated potato varieties in the Andes (Werge, 1979). Chuño is light, portable, and shelf-stable, providing a reliable source of daily sustenance. ...
Chuño is created by subjecting Solanum subspecies or other tubers to a process of freeze-drying that reduces their weight and renders them highly storable. Despite the importance of chuño within traditional Andean foodways, we know strikingly little regarding the antiquity of the freeze-drying practice used to create potato chuño. In this study, we present starch granule evidence for the presence of chuño on ceramic and lithic artifacts from the Middle Horizon (A.D. 600–1000) site of Quilcapampa La Antigua, a Wari-affiliated outpost in the Sihuas Valley, Peru. We argue that damage patterns on the archaeologically recovered starch granules are consistent with expectations for chuño. This research has the potential to impact investigations into the domestication and use of potatoes by early Andean communities and other communities around the world who have incorporated potatoes into their foodways.
... Chuño blanco, also referred to a tunta, is another variety of chuño. While the process of repeated freezing, thawing, and trampling is essentially the same, there are key differences in processing methods (Werge, 1979). Specifically, small bitter potatoes are laid out at night to freeze, trampled in the early morning, and then collected in the morning and stored under blankets to avoid the sunlight; the lack of exposure to sunlight gives chuño blanco its characteristic appearance due to the formation a white crust on the outside of the tuber. ...
Identification of diagnostic signatures of food processing practices in the starch grain record has recently revolutionized our ability to understand foodways, particularly in the Old World. In this paper, we build upon extant starch grain research on chu˜no, a freeze-dried potato product produced in the Andean highlands, to develop criteria for the identification of chuño types in the archaeological record. We analyzed two hundred modern starches from four chuño blanco and chuño negro sources in Peru and Bolivia. Our results reveal differences in morphology and statistically significant (p < 0.0001) discrepancies in size metrics between the two chuño types that can be used to distinguish archaeological starches. This set of criteria has great potential to inform our understandings of the origins of potato domestication, the development and spread of detoxification methods, taste preferences and cuisine, social (ayllu) affiliations, and highland to lowland trade networks in the Andean past.
Distribución del gasto anual promedio‐familiar”. 12 vs
- Encuesta Nacional De Consumo De Alimentos