I don't remember whether we baked, boiled, or fried our buried treasure, but Katherine and I still remember the excitement of digging for our dinner.

Did you know?

• Potatoes are distant cousins of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants, all members of the Solanaceae family.
• People started digging up potatoes in the Andes about 7,000 years ago, and haven't stopped since.
• Potatoes come in an array of colors — look for red, gold, blue, and purple potatoes at farmers markets and vegetable stands.

Find it!

• You can find eight farms selling potatoes from Manistee to the Mackinac Bridge in the Michigan Land Use Institute's online guide to local farm foods, www.LocalDifference.org .
• Press the “Search Now” button in the “Find a Farm!” box, click on “potatoes,” and the county you're interested in, and then “Find it!” for a list of farms.
• You can also click on the “vegetable” category during the search — most vegetable farms sell potatoes.

Try it!

• Out camping? Cut up some onions, potatoes, and green peppers into one-inch chunks, toss in a few whole, unpeeled cloves of garlic to keep the vampires away, add a little butter, and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Wrap the veggies in a triple layer of aluminum foil, and roast them in the coals for 45 minutes, or until the potatoes are done. It's best to make individual foil packages for each person.
• Potato, Green Bean and Tomato Salad
  Use equal amounts of potatoes, green beans and halved cherry tomatoes. Cut potatoes into 1-2 inch chunks (or use small, new potatoes) and boil them until you can pierce them with a fork. Dunk them in cold water to stop them from cooking, then drain thoroughly. Blanch green beans in boiling water for 1 minute, or until they turn bright green. Combine them with tomatoes, green beans, and a little chopped red onion (1/2 an onion should do the trick for a family-sized bowl), a bunch of chopped parsley, salt and pepper. Add a splash of red or white wine vinegar, drizzle a little olive oil over the top, and toss gently.
• Toss a combination of potatoes, turnips, parsnips, rutabaga, sweet potatoes, squash (cut the veggies into two-inch chunks), onions (chopped or sliced), and garlic (whole cloves), into a large roasting pan. Sprinkle with salt, pepper and a dash of cayenne, pour on a generous amount of olive oil (you can also use butter) and bake at 350 degrees, stirring every 15 minutes, for 45-60 minutes.

• Herby Potato Rösti
  (From Easy Vegetarian )
  3 large potatoes, peeled and grated
  3-4 large sage leaves, finely chopped
  Leaves from 1 sprig of thyme, finely chopped
  ¼ cup olive oil
  salt and pepper
  Grate the potatoes and drain on paper towels, squeezing the potatoes to remove as much moisture as possible. Mix in the herbs. Use your hands to shape heaping tablespoons of the potato mixture into balls. Heat half of the oil in a large skillet until it sizzles when you sprinkle water on it. Add half the potato balls and flatten them with a spatula. Sauté for 5 minutes, then flip them over, lower the heat and cook for 5-10 minutes, until cooked through. Keep the potato cakes warm in the oven (on lowest heat setting) while you cook the rest of the potato cakes.