Origin of Potatoes and Point, When You Fail to Afford the Food So You Fantasize the Flavor

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Gary. I’m calling from Felton, Delaware. I’ve heard you talk about different things, experiences, and this is one that I had with my grandmother years ago when I was a young parent growing up. and I was just kind of telling her, you know, it’s so difficult feeding the family and all this other kind of stuff, and she came up with a story that she told me that her family did. And she says sometimes at dinnertime, they would sit down around the table and they’d always all be seated at the table and one would say, pass the potatoes. And then they point and they’d say, and the turkey. And of course there was no turkey. And then the next person passed the potatoes and they would point and say the roast beef. And they would pass the potatoes, and of course there was no roast beef. But the meal became Potatoes and Point because all they had, all they could afford to buy was potatoes. And that was a meal that they gave a name to, Potatoes and Point, for the dinner tonight.

That is a great version of that story because this story, believe it or not, Gary, some version of this has been going around since the 1790s.

Oh, okay. I didn’t hear that.

Is your family of Irish heritage, perhaps?

Well, her maiden name is Riley. And, yeah, they came over on the boat. Her parents did. Now, they came over in the 1800s. I mean, my grandmother’s long been passed. So, yeah.

Yeah, it’s called Potatoes and Point. And it’s existed particularly in Irish storytelling. Maybe sometimes, the way I should phrase this is, there’s been an argument for a couple hundred years about whether or not this was just a joke or people actually did it. And it is literally versions of what you’re talking about. You have a make-believe meal. So you only have potatoes to eat, and you either mention things that don’t exist or you have the things, but they’re saved. So, like, you might touch your potato to the cheese but not eat the cheese or wave your potato at the salt cellar but not have salt. And variations include bread and point, or bread and pull it, or bread and think, and bread and skip. All of these are about having only the first thing mentioned and not the second, if the second is.

So all of the different things. Okay, that’s great. It’s tangled here politically and historically as well with the culture of Ireland being under the thumb of the English. So almost all of the earliest mentions for a very long time have some form of political content to them. They’re about the hungry people of Ireland. And, of course, the famine happened by the 1840s. But even prior to that, in the decades before that, the earliest use that I know in an Irish newspaper, an Irish newspaper that was actually shut down later by the British for being too partisan, the Northern Star in Belfast.

Yeah. The quote is, behold, two thirds of you countrymen, miserable, oppressed and naked, literally feeding on potatoes and point. P.O.I.N.T. Point.

Wow. Gary, did you have any idea that this was any more widespread than your family?

No, I had no idea. I didn’t have a clue. This is a story she simply told me. And I actually told my sister about it. And she says, I never heard that story. It was just me talking to her, I guess.

There are other theories about what that point is doing there, but most sources and authorities agree that it is literally about pointing your food or pointing at a thing that you can’t have or won’t have. Can’t have.

Okay, great. Sometimes it’s literally, like you said, pointing at the air and the thing doesn’t even exist. That’s how she explained it to me.

Well, great. I’m glad to hear about that. It’s a real thing.

It is indeed. Well, Gary, thanks so much for calling.

Okay.

Well, thank you for taking my call.

All right. Take care now.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Well, those conversations around the family dinner table often lead to interesting discussions about language, and we’d love for you to bring yours to us. 877-929-9673.