Q 01/05

The first written mention of the potato is a 1567 delivery receipt from the Canary Islands to which port?

A) Seville

B) Antwerp

C) Lisbon

D) Genoa

Answer · why

B) Antwerp

The Canaries were the first place outside Central and South America where potatoes were grown. Spain took up the crop around 1570 and the British Isle...

Q 02/05

The Taíno word batata, source of the English word via Spanish patata, originally meant which crop?

A) Cassava root

B) The sweet potato

C) A ground fruit

D) The earth apple

Answer · why

B) The sweet potato

The two crops are unrelated: the sweet potato belongs to the morning glory family, while the potato is a nightshade.

Q 03/05

The cultivated potato Solanum tuberosum is a tetraploid with how many chromosomes?

A) 12

B) 24

C) 36

D) 48

Answer · why

D) 48

Diploid relatives such as S. phureja have 24, triploids 36 and the pentaploid S. curtilobum 60. A 2025 study grouped every domesticated potato under S...

Q 04/05

Potatoes were first domesticated around which lake on the Peru-Bolivia border?

A) Poopó

B) Titicaca

C) Junín

D) Maracaibo

Answer · why

B) Titicaca

Domestication happened 7,000 to 10,000 years ago from a species in the S. brevicaule complex. Wild potatoes range from the southern US to southern Chi...

Q 05/05

Chuño, the Andean freeze-dried potato, is made by leaving potatoes out for three nights at what temperature?

A) Around minus 5 °C

B) Around minus 25 °C

C) Around 0 °C

D) Around minus 40 °C

Answer · why

A) Around minus 5 °C

The June and July nights above 3,800 metres freeze the tubers and the daytime sun dries them. Carl Troll argued this natural freeze-drying helped the ...