Recipe for Potato and Jerusalem Artichoke Latkes

Reader Contribution by Ellen Sandbeck
Published on October 23, 2012
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Last week I had a hankering for latkes, which, as everyone knows, are traditional pre-Halloween food. The good thing about hankering after latkes in mid-October is that the ground hasn’t frozen yet, so it is still possible to dig up some of the feral Jerusalem artichokes that grow along the fence that protects our strawberry beds from Maisie.

The other traditional time for latkes is during Hanukah, which very inconveniently occurs after the Jerusalem artichokes are frozen solidly into the ground. J.A.s don’t store spectacularly well, but every year I try to coddle along enough of them to enliven our Thanksgiving mashed potatoes and our Hanukah latkes.

A few years ago I read the astonishing news that potatoes are a very high glycemic food. The glycemic index compares the impact of various foods on human volunteers’ blood sugar levels. Pure glucose is 100 on the scale. Foods that score below 55 are considered low glycemic; foods between 56-69 are considered medium; and a score above 70 is considered high glycemic. I have been a natural foods eater my entire life, so imagine my horror when I read that the glycemic index number for boiled potatoes can be as high as 103, while the glycemic index number for a Snicker’s bar is 43. I am not planning to convert to an all-Snicker’s diet any time soon, but I did want to figure out what I could do to soften the impact of eating my own homegrown potatoes.

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