A Schooner of Science

Green potatoes are poisonous

// September 9th, 2011 // Science at Home

So I was cooking dinner tonight and had a hankering for potato wedges. Unfortunately, in a fit of nonsense I had put my potato in the fruit basket to ripen. Ridiculous. So it had turned greenish.

Now I’m a pretty frugal, food-saving kinda person and hate throwing stuff out, but I had a feeling that this was one of those times. One of those “better safe than sorry” times, so I checked the interwebz and then threw it out.

If you’re ever in a similar quandary, here’s why not to eat green potatoes.

Potatoes make glycoalkaloids, chemicals that protects them from insects and fungi. They are especially fond of these chemicals when they are damaged or growing new plants, when they go green and sprout from their eyes.

One of these chemicals is called solanine, a poison made by deadly nightshide (a member of the same family, Solanaceae, along with tomatoes).

Solanine poisoning resembles gastroenteritis, so vomiting, pooping, and generally upsetting symptoms. The CSIRO says that, seeing as the symptoms are the same, some undiagnosed cases of gastro might be due to green potatoes. (So glad I didn’t eat them.)

I usually keep potatoes in the fridge, which is apparently also bad. At the chilly 2-6 degrees celsius of a fridge, the starch turns quickly into high levels of sugar, causing them to brown quickly during frying. So you’re supposed to keep them in a paper bag in a dark cupboard.

So much dinner-time learning! Oh – and the replacement meal, curried roast vegetable couscous, was delicious.