When you open a bag of potato chips, do you ever stop and think that those were grown on a farm? Or wonder where that farm was? Or who the farmer was who grew ’em?
Potatoes grow all over the U.S., but they have specific seasons. You have to use fresh potatoes for chips because of moisture content (it takes four pounds of potatoes to make one pound of chips!).
Most times of years, those potatoes are coming from multiple locations. But in the summer – including the all-important 4th of July – a tiny part of NE North Carolina is the only game in town for the 3/4s of Americans who live east of the Rockies. That means when we all celebrate America’s birthday, most of us are eating chips grown right here!
In this first of a two-part episode, we’ll show you what makes a perfect potato chip, how they’re grown, and introduce you to some of the great North Carolina farmers who grow them.
