Join Willy as he works with the communities to learn how to make chuño!
Chuño is a freeze-dried potato that comes from the ancient communities of Bolivia and Peru. The process allows you to preserve potatoes after processing for very long periods of time, in excess of up to 10 years possibly. The process to make Chuño takes a few days and requires night temperatures to fall below freezing.
Here is how to convert potatoes to Chuño... Harvest your potatoes. These potatoes must be harvested in the fall so that they will last long enough that the night temperatures fall below freezing. Any size potato will work, but the process works best with small potatoes especially if the temperatures at night don't get much below freezing. The potatoes are spread out and allowed to freeze. This needs to be done three nights in a row.
During the days, between the three freezing nights, the potatoes are allowed to thaw, but some do not want the direct sun to hit the potatoes during this stage. Each day, after thawing, they are crushed/mashed/trampled to remove as much of the liquid from the potatoes as possible. This also separates the potato from the skins, which are discarded or used for any other purpose.
Chuno is obtained directly from freezing, trampling, and refreezing. After the third night of freezing temperatures, the potatoes are then just left to dry in the sun.
