Saratoga Potatoes (1873, 1875); Flying Saucer (26 June 1947)

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SARATOGA POTATOES

   This is the earliest on ancestry.com.


   18 October 1873, STEVENS POINT JOURNAL, (Stevens Point, Wisconsin), pg. 1,
col. 3:
   And now descend we, at one full swoop, from esthetics to--potatoes.
   Perhaps you know very little about these except their daintiness.  You may
have driven out from your hotel this summer and returned with a cornucopia of
"potatoes _a la_ Saratoga," and entertained a kind of dim fancy, if you have
thought of it all, that they grow in some such mysterious way; but the
original article is no more like their crisp, brown, brittle bits of deliciousness
than the original "What is it" is like a civilized, cultivated man.  No; the
original potato is a dirty, ugly tuber, with its mother earth clinging closely
around it, and needs divers and sundry operations before it can be presented to
your artistic eyes.


   5 August 1875, COSHOCTON AGE (Coshocton, Ohio), pg.4?, col. 2:
   SARATOGA FRIED POTATOES.--The following is said to be all there is of the
cook's secret for producing those world-renowned potatoes served at Moon's
Lake House, Saratoga Springs, every summer: Peel good-sized potatoes, and slice
them as evenly as possible; drop them into ice water.  Have a kettle of lard,
as for fried cakes, and very hot.  Put a few at a time into a towel, shake them
about to dry them, and then drop into the hot lard.  Stir them occasionally;
and when of a light brown take them out with a skimmer.  If properly done they
will not be all greasy, but crisp without and mealy within.

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FLYING SAUCER

  I'm glad that Fred brought up that "flying saucer" cite.  It plays an
important role in American food.  Witness this recent post to rec.food.historic:

Perhaps the space people took the maize from the Americas to Asia, then
destroyed the evidence? :)
Andy Smith

   From ancestry.com.


   26 June 1947, BRADFORD ERA (Bradford, Pennsylvania), pg. 16, col. 5:
_Nine Fast-Flying_
_Objects SIghted_
_By Pilot in Oregon_
   Pendleton, Ore.--(AP)--Nine bright, saucer-like objects flying at
"incredible" speed at 10,000 feet altitude were reported here yesterday by Kenneth
Arnold, Boise, Idaho, pilot, who said he could not hazard a guess as to what they
were.
   Arnold, a United States forest service employe engaged in searching for a
missing plane, said he sighted the mysterious objects Tuesday at 3 p.m.  They
were flying between Mount Rainier and Mount Adams, in Washington state, he
said, and appeared to weave in and out of formation.  Arnold said he clocked them
and estimated their speed at 1,200 miles an hour.
   Inquiries at Yakima brought only blank stares, he said, but he added he
talked with an unidentified man from Ukiah, south of here, who said he had seen
similar objects over the mountains near Ukiah Tuesday.
   "It seems impossible," Arnold said, "but there it is."
   After the incident, he said, he talked to other pilots when he landed at
Yakima, Wash., but none of them had seen anything similar.
   At Portland, Ore., Edward Leach, senior CAA aeronautical inspector, said
he could offer no explanation of the fast-flying objects reported by Arnold.


   26 June 1947, POTTSTOWN MERCURY (Pottstown, Pennsylvania), pg.11, col. 4:
_Forest Pilot Reports_
_Saucer-Like Objects_
_Flying in Washington_
(...)


   30 June 1947, ATCHISON DAILY GLOBE (Atchison, Kansas), pg.
_Continue Controversy_
_On "Flying Saucers"_
   SEATTLE, Wash., June 30--(AP)--The "flying sauce" controversy continued
today with eyewitness converts almost as numerous as the announced skeptics.
   The last appearance of the mystery objects seem "tumbling" or "undulating"
through the skies from Texas to Canada, was reported last night.  Frank M.
King of San Leandro, Calif., told newsmen he and a group of friends heard a
"swishing, whistling sound" and, from his backyard, sighted a "gleaming object"
last night.
   "The moon was shining brightly  and we could see it plainly," he said.
"It seemed to be oval in shape and fairly flat."
   However, while the mystery continued to baffle many, Ray Taro, Everett,
Wash., iron works operator, refused to be alarmed.  For several weeks he has
been melting down beer bottle caps for the metal.  The "saucers," he asserts, are
merely the unfazed aluminum disks carried hundreds of feet into the air by
blowers and 300 degrees of heat, and wafted away by air currents.
   The controversy began after Kenneth Arnold, Boise, Idaho, aspiring
businessman, reported last Tuesday he saw nine mysterious objects whirring over
western Washington.   He estimated their speed at 1,200 miles an hour.
   Other sky gazers in Kansas City and Oklahoma City have also reported
sighting the mystery objects.


(THEY INTEND TO TAKE OUR TOMATOES, POTATOES, AND MAIZE TO ASIA!--ed.)