On Tue, 5 Oct 1999, Alan Lundin wrote:
> I not only ate lots and lots of raw potatos as a child,
> I went for long periods of time in college where raw
> potatos were all I had to eat.  Turns out I didn't die,
> nor did I even get the slightest bit sick.

Todd Moody wrote:
>... we
>have a surprising number of people here who have eaten them raw
>without any discernible ill effects.

I wanted to know more about potatoes toxins, and found out
what astonished me, that's not only the green parts that
contain the potatoes toxin, solanin.
Solanin is very much increased in green parts of potatoes
and in "injured" potatoes. And much higher sightly under she skin,
than inside.
Many solanin decreasing techniques are common in use.
First, cooking decreases solanin.
Avoiding green and injured takes off the real poisonous pieces.
Solanin is water soluble and the custom to lay them in water
(sometime overnight!) or cooking them in water, throwing the water
away, gets rid of most of the solanin.
Modern potatoe varieties are selected to have little solanin too.

500 gm Solanin are considered to be lethal.
50 gm Solanin are considered to start toxic reactions.
3-5 mg solanin per 100g are still found in processed
(cooked) potatoe products.
So, at about 1kg potatoe (readily processed) toxic reactions
can still be expected.
This may sound much, but if you imagine that one human
needs about 2kg *per day* for its calories (on a potatoe based
nutrition) it may easily be reached.
E.g. in Ireland some 100 years ago.

So how could Alan the Irish have beared it?
After all, solanin is a alcaloid.
Like nikotin is and like caffeine is.
My own experience shows that the body *can* learn to be
accustomed to elevated alcaloid levels.
Possibly by additional detoxifying capacity of the liver.
Coffee hasn't the equal strong effects after getting used to it.

However, playing around with  toxins isn't everybodys thing.

>If people can eat them raw now without getting sick, then
>presumably people in the Pleistocene could have done so, unless
>the potatoes available to them were toxic in ways that modern
>potatoes are not.  This is certainly a possibility, but do we
>have any actual information about it?

Raw potatoe juice is said to have a beneficial effect on
some diseases. I think that exactely the toxins
may it be lectins or solanin, may achieve this positive effect.
After all the difference between a medicine and a toxin
is determined by the *dose*.
There are many medicine plants which can be rather toxic in
amounts.

This contributes to the "spreading risks" theeory.

regards

Amadeus