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Can the Idaho Potato Museum be a model for Fallbrook and avocados?

Joe Naiman

Village News Reporter

After visiting the Idaho Potato Museum in Blackfoot, Idaho, I began wondering whether Fallbrook's avocado and tourism industries could benefit from an avocado museum in Fallbrook.

Idaho and Ireland are probably the two places best known for potatoes. I was already in Idaho on St. Patrick's Day, so when I saw the freeway sign for the potato museum in Blackfoot, I had to take advantage of the opportunity. For me it was a spur-of-the-moment decision rather than a planned visit, but the freeway sign likely induces spur-of-the-moment visits even when it's not St. Patrick's Day and the fact that the museum is open seven days a week from June to August and six days a week (Sunday excepted) from September to May means that people visit the potato museum throughout the year.

Blackfoot is the county seat of Bingham County, which produces more potatoes than any other county in the United States. Approximately 30% of the nation's potatoes are grown in Idaho with the Russet Burbank being the most common variety. Nearly all of Idaho's potatoes are grown in the southern part of the state.

Admission to the Idaho Potato Museum is $6, although my AAA membership got me in for $5.50 and if I was a senior or military member, I also would have paid that price. The Idaho Potato Museum is in a building which was a railroad depot when construction was completed in 1913.

The displays include the history of the potato from Peru to Europe to the United States. The soil of southern Idaho made potatoes a lucrative cash crop, and Idaho farmers and marketeers began to export potatoes. In 1995 potato seeds were germinated on the space shuttle Columbia, expanding potato growth to outer space.

The Idaho Potato Museum includes displays on cultivating, shipping, processing, and marketing. One display noted that an entrepreneur went east to convince restaurants to serve baked potatoes with dinner meals. Until then I had taken for granted that restaurant meals always had a baked potato option. The wisdom of that businessman helped not only the potato industry in Idaho but also diners throughout the United States.

A harvesting company called Spudnik underwrote a three-dimensional virtual reality display of harvesting. McDonald's, whose French fries would not be possible without potatoes, provided a video of how potatoes become McDonald's French fries after harvesting and processing.

The displays also include peelers, mashers, and other potato cooking tools used by the consumer. A Mr. Potato Head exhibit is also part of the museum.

The artifacts include the world's largest potato chip (5.4 ounces). When Dan Quayle was the Vice-President of the United States he was ridiculed for misspelling "potato," but during a book signing he was asked to autograph a potato which is now in the museum. (His publicist wasn't pleased, but Dan Quayle signed happily.)

A gift shop is on one side of the museum. The Potato Station Cafe is on the other side. My lunch that day consisted of a baked potato with fixings, French fries, tater tots, and potato ice cream. Prior to ordering my meal, I didn't realize ice cream could be made from potatoes. The Potato Station Cafe takes on-line orders, although I doubt they deliver to Fallbrook.

Museum admission includes "free taters for out-of-staters," which is a five-ounce package of buttered mash potato mix. The gift shop sells various other items including potato peelers, seasoning spice, and potato products as well as the likes of keychains, magnets, mugs, patches, and postcards.

The Idaho Potato Museum opens at 9:30 a.m. throughout the year and closes at 5 p.m. from September to May and at 7 p.m. from June to August.

The museum is on Main Street, which is a couple of miles away from Interstate 15. Fallbrook is nearly 900 miles south of Blackfoot on Interstate 15.

 

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