the potato how the humble spud rescued the western world

The oak was used to make Elizabeth's navy. Actually, Cromwell ordered all the native forests felled so that rebellious Irish could not gain shelter and supplies from them. We're told that the Irish landscape had been denuded of trees for cask making. I can only really comment on the Irish and would add a few points - the author probably had to discard much salient information to keep the book at a reasonable length.

We get good contrasts between Irish and English circumstances, including factory workers' conditions, followed by an enlightening look at the French. Potatoes could also be fed to pigs, as could the peels.

But the good crop, ease of growing and harvesting and the ease of baking or boiling made potatoes popular with cottage dwellers. When potatoes came along, and emerged from gardens, they were shunned by the wealthy because wealthy people ate meats and fruits, not muddy roots. There's no mention of the medieval trencher, a half-loaf placed on the table in front of a diner and onto which a stew was ladled. Baking was done once every two or three weeks, often communally, and the bread was always eaten with a soup or something in which to sop it as it would have gone rock hard. The bread couldn't be baked every day in a cottage, because they hadn't ovens, and they hadn't fuel. When they couldn't, because of price or growing conditions, they ate rye bread or oats. Europe ate grain, meaning wheat bread if people could get it. Importing the potato from the Andes took some time to catch on, and only the fact of it thriving in Europe's conditions made it popular. We can be glad all over again that we did not live in the old days. The print is very small in this factual book, which covers the daily diets of the majority of people in Europe for a few centuries.

The potato how the humble spud rescued the western world