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Is potato both a staple food and a dish?
Potatoes have been planted in China for more than 400 years, mostly as vegetables.

Vegetable experts firmly believe that they belong to vegetables because they are rich in water and vitamin C; But food experts insist that it should be counted as food, because potatoes contain starch. In the past, many people lived on it during the famine era, and westerners still used potatoes as their staple food! Potatoes have long been included in the world's four staple foods (wheat, corn, rice and potatoes) by FAO.

Fan Zhihong, an associate professor in the Department of Nutrition and Food Safety, College of Food Science, China Agricultural University, and a doctor of food science, thinks that potatoes and lotus roots contain a lot of starch, and the content of carotene, folic acid and vitamin K is much higher than that of ordinary staple food, while the starch content is higher than that of green leafy vegetables, and the nutritional value is between grain and vegetables. If these foods are used to partially replace cereals, the nutritional value can be enhanced and the supply of potassium, vitamin C and dietary fiber can be increased. But too much starch can easily lead to obesity, so fried shredded potato rice, potato steamed bread and barbecue are fattening food combinations. Because shredded potatoes contain starch, it is reasonable to eat shredded potatoes to reduce the amount of rice, otherwise it is equivalent to eating two staple foods.

At present, only a few areas in China regard potatoes as staple food, and more of them are eaten as vegetables. In 20 15, the Ministry of Agriculture started the strategy of potato (commonly known as potato) staple food, and promoted potato processing into steamed bread, noodles, rice noodles and other staple foods. Potatoes will become another staple food besides rice, wheat and corn. In fact, the staple food of potatoes is to process potatoes into bread, steamed bread, noodles and other staple food products adapted to China people's consumption habits, and change from non-staple food consumption to staple food consumption. It is estimated that more than 50% of potatoes will be consumed as staple food in 2020.

Dai Xiaofeng, director of the Institute of Agricultural Products Processing of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, vividly said, "What you usually eat in your hand is called staple food, and what you put in the middle plate is called non-staple food or vegetables." . Crops that become staple crops must be able to produce on a large scale in a relatively large area; Can be stored in large quantities for a long time; Most people can accept it, accounting for the main proportion of three meals a day; Can provide the energy and nutrition that most people need. "At present, the staple food is the so-called whole grains, including potatoes." Dai Xiaofeng said that potatoes do not contain gluten, and when making staple food products such as steamed bread and noodles, there are some problems, such as difficult molding, difficult production, high hardness, and difficult cooking of noodles. At present, China Academy of Agricultural Sciences has successfully developed potato steamed bread containing 40% potato flour and potato noodles containing 35% potato flour, and has initially realized industrial production; At the same time, we also developed a series of products, such as potato steamed bread self-raising flour, potato flour composite powder and so on. In the future, ordinary people can also make potato steamed bread and noodles at home.

Wang Xiaohu, director of the Institute of Food and Nutrition Development of the Ministry of Agriculture, believes that compared with wheat, corn and rice, potato has many advantages and has its own conditions to become a staple food. Dai Xiaofeng said that although fresh potatoes have high water content and are not resistant to storage and transportation, they are processed into whole powder and stored as dry matter, which is much more resistant to storage and transportation than flour and rice.