Huh? Fresh potatoes are just better, as evidenced by the fact that my own home-growns are sought after by anyone who’s had the privilege to taste one! Try making some pierogies, and fill half with bought potatoes and half with fresh ones from the garden. You WILL be able to tell the difference. Also, potatoes are so easy to grow (or even difficult to stop growing) it’s no effort.
Yeah, my mom swears up and down on garden tomatoes being much better. She is Polish, so I assume she knows what she’s talking about. Personally, I do think they do taste a bit better, but I grew up eating a lot of potatoes.
Try parchment paper if you’re having trouble getting it from the peel to the oven. It browns just as well on the bottom as if there was no parchment paper there, and it’s foolproof.
I love this and plan to use it, with a byline for you of course, billed as “some guy” as in “some guy on line referred to them as Economies of Fail…” 
That should read “potatoes,” of course.
Potatoes go for something like $ .50 a pound and they are not that much better out of the garden. Radishes and tomatoes on the other hand are demonstrably better out of the garden and the economics get you a better return on investment.
Canned tomatoes are usually fresh plum style tomatoes when canned and better for making a sauce that just about anything “fresh” you could buy in the grocery store.
Yeah, fresh grocery store tomatoes almost invariably suck. Just terrible. Strawberries, too. When I was younger, I used to think that all these tomato sauce recipes sucked, when it was the fact that I was using fresh grocery store tomatoes instead of good canned tomatoes, under the impression that, well, something “fresh” must be better. That’s true if you’re growing your own tomatoes, or buy tomatoes at a farmer’s market. Otherwise, canned tomatoes all the way.
As for the potatoes–yeah, it’s not worth it for me. My folks beg to differ, though. I’m not as discerning about my potatoes.
That’s okay. When someone googles the phrase, itll lead back to me.
Well, me and Thomas Bittman.
Is that a philosophical or gustatory claim?
Also, if store-bought is nigh-imperceptably worse but, obviously, less effort – or less money – does that enter into the equation? Especially if it’s a gustatory claim.
I am not quite sure what the question means but in my opinion whenever I have had something that was made “in small batches with quality ingrediants” the difference was not imperceptable. Yes time and money does enter into the equation but not because I can’t tell the difference in quality but because I determined that I need to eat something and store bought soup is quicker and easier than making my own at own at that time even though my soup is way better. And again I don’t eat some of the things like Oreos that others are saying can’t be made better at home.
I mentioned the gum because I have never heard of anyone making thier own gum since my grandmother’s times of chewing on wax or resin. However there are recipes.
homemade food with inferior ingrediants is still inferior food eg sugar cookies made with margerine and vanillin will not taste as good (to me) as the same recipe of cookies made with butter and real vanilla. YMMV