These potato trivia questions and answers come in four rounds: from the Andes to the world, the plant itself, potato dishes and where they come from, and potato words and the Potato Center.
Read the full guide
Four rounds for a potato bar or a harvest festival
From the Andes to the world follows the potato from Peru and Bolivia to Europe, with the blight of the 1840s. The plant itself explains eyes, seed potatoes and the green fruits. Potato dishes and where they come from is the long round: rösti, gnocchi, boxty, champ, clapshot and more. Potato words and the Potato Center asks where the words potato and spud come from.
Quiz a table or yourself
Tap a choice to check it; the reason and the page it was read on appear with the answer. Scored round asks 20 before it marks any. Team scores go on paper.
Questions and answers
What are some easy potato trivia questions?
In which mountains was the potato first domesticated? What tops a shepherd's pie? By which name is a baked potato known in the United Kingdom? The answers are the Andes, mashed potato and a jacket potato.
Where do potatoes come from?
The Andes of South America. Potatoes were domesticated about 7,000 to 10,000 years ago in what is now southern Peru and northwestern Bolivia, and the Spanish brought them to Europe in the second half of the 16th century.
How many kinds of potato are there?
The International Potato Center counts more than 4,000 varieties of native potatoes, mostly in the Andes, and over 180 wild species that are too bitter to eat.
How were the answers checked?
Each was read on October 3, 2026 on the page linked under it: the International Potato Center's facts page for 13 questions and Wikipedia for the rest. Harvest figures and country rankings are left out because they change every year.
About how long ago were potatoes domesticated?Answer: 7,000 to 10,000 years ago. Source: Wikipedia: Potato
Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, who championed the potato in France, first had to eat potatoes where?Answer: In a Prussian prison. Source: Wikipedia: Antoine-Augustin Parmentier
The Great Famine in Ireland began in which year?Answer: 1845. Source: Wikipedia: Great Famine (Ireland)
In which mountains was the potato first domesticated?Answer: The Andes. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
The organism that causes potato blight is not a true fungus. What is it?Answer: A water mold. Source: Wikipedia: Phytophthora infestans
The potato was first domesticated in a region that now lies in which two countries?Answer: Peru and Bolivia. Source: Wikipedia: History of the potato
Up to what height above sea level can potatoes grow, according to the International Potato Center?Answer: 4,700 meters. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
What is chuño, a food of the Andes?Answer: Potatoes dried by freezing them at night and sunning them by day. Source: Wikipedia: Chuño
Which disease of the potato crop, found across Europe in the 1840s, was the immediate cause of the Great Famine?Answer: Blight. Source: Wikipedia: Great Famine (Ireland)
Which people brought the potato from the Americas to Europe?Answer: The Spanish. Source: Wikipedia: Potato
Which president had "potatoes served in the French manner" at a White House dinner in 1802?Answer: Thomas Jefferson. Source: Wikipedia: French fries
Which year did the United Nations declare the International Year of the Potato?Answer: 2008. Source: Wikipedia: International Year of the Potato
Who is commonly credited, along with Thomas Harriot, with bringing potatoes into England?Answer: Sir Francis Drake. Source: Wikipedia: History of the potato
The plant itself 13
After it flowers, a potato plant bears small green fruits. What do they look like?Answer: Green cherry tomatoes. Source: Wikipedia: Potato
How closely are the potato and the sweet potato related?Answer: Only distantly. Source: Wikipedia: Sweet potato
How many new tubers can one potato plant grown this way produce?Answer: 5 to 20. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
How many varieties of native potatoes are there, mostly in the Andes?Answer: More than 4,000. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
In which country was the Yukon Gold potato developed in the 1960s?Answer: Canada. Source: Wikipedia: Yukon Gold potato
One hectare of potatoes can yield how much food, set against a grain crop?Answer: Two to four times as much. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
Potato plants also bear berries with true botanical seeds. How do plants raised from those seeds differ?Answer: They are genetically different from the mother plant. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
There are over 180 species of wild potato. Why are they not eaten?Answer: They are too bitter. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
Up to how many times more efficient than cereals are potatoes in their use of water?Answer: Seven times. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
What do growers call the potato, or piece of potato, that is planted to raise a new plant?Answer: A seed. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
What do the "eyes" on a potato protect?Answer: The buds from which new stems grow. Source: Wikipedia: Potato
What is the scientific name of the potato?Answer: Solanum tuberosum. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
Which American plant breeder gave his name to the russet potato most widely grown in North America?Answer: Luther Burbank. Source: Wikipedia: Russet Burbank
Potato dishes and where they come from 21
A popular legend ties the invention of the potato chip to which town in New York?Answer: Saratoga Springs. Source: Wikipedia: Potato chips
A Spanish omelette is made with eggs and which vegetable?Answer: Potatoes. Source: Wikipedia: Spanish omelette
An early recipe for mashed potato is in a cookery book of 1747 by which writer?Answer: Hannah Glasse. Source: Wikipedia: Mashed potato
Boxty is a traditional potato pancake of which country?Answer: Ireland. Source: Wikipedia: Boxty
Bubble and squeak is an English dish of cooked potatoes fried with which vegetable?Answer: Cabbage. Source: Wikipedia: Bubble and squeak
By which name is a baked potato known in the United Kingdom?Answer: A jacket potato. Source: Wikipedia: Baked potato
Champ is an Irish dish of mashed potatoes with butter, milk and which vegetable?Answer: Scallions. Source: Wikipedia: Champ (food)
Clapshot is a traditional Scottish dish that began in which group of islands?Answer: Orkney. Source: Wikipedia: Clapshot
Duchess potatoes are a purée of mashed potato, butter and what else?Answer: Egg yolk. Source: Wikipedia: Duchess potatoes
Gnocchi are dumplings from the cooking of which country?Answer: Italy. Source: Wikipedia: Gnocchi
Gratin dauphinois, sliced potatoes baked in cream, comes from a region in the southeast of which country?Answer: France. Source: Wikipedia: Gratin dauphinois
Hash browns are a breakfast food of which country?Answer: The United States. Source: Wikipedia: Hash browns
In French cooking, shepherd's pie carries the name of a champion of the potato. What is it called?Answer: Hachis Parmentier. Source: Wikipedia: Shepherd's pie
In the British dish bangers and mash, what are the bangers?Answer: Sausages. Source: Wikipedia: Bangers and mash
In the dish aloo gobi, aloo is potato. What is gobi?Answer: Cauliflower. Source: Wikipedia: Aloo gobhi
In the Swiss dish raclette, what is melted and scraped onto the plate beside boiled potatoes?Answer: Cheese. Source: Wikipedia: Raclette
Papa a la huancaína, boiled potatoes in a spicy, creamy sauce, is an appetizer from which country?Answer: Peru. Source: Wikipedia: Papa a la huancaína
Rösti, potatoes fried in a pan, is a dish of which country?Answer: Switzerland. Source: Wikipedia: Rösti
Salt potatoes are a regional dish of which city in New York?Answer: Syracuse. Source: Wikipedia: Salt potatoes
What tops a shepherd's pie?Answer: Mashed potato. Source: Wikipedia: Shepherd's pie
Which vegetable joins potatoes, onions and cream in the cold soup vichyssoise?Answer: Leeks. Source: Wikipedia: Vichyssoise
Potato words and the Potato Center 7
By the International Potato Center's account, the potato is the third most important food crop for people to eat. Which two come first?Answer: Rice and wheat. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
The English word potato comes, through Spanish, from a Taino word that meant what?Answer: Sweet potato. Source: Wikipedia: Potato
How many accessions of native, wild and improved potatoes does the International Potato Center keep in its collection?Answer: More than 7,000. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
In the party game hot potato, what do the players do while the music plays?Answer: Toss a small object to each other. Source: Wikipedia: Hot potato
In which city is the headquarters of the International Potato Center?Answer: Lima, Peru. Source: International Potato Center: Potato Facts and Figures
In which year was the term "couch potato" first coined?Answer: 1976. Source: Wikipedia: Couch potato
Spud, a name for a potato, goes back to a 15th-century word for what?Answer: A short, stout knife or dagger. Source: Wikipedia: Potato
How this list was compiled
Written for this site; nothing was copied from another list. Questions and wrong choices are our own. Each explanation restates, in our own sentences, facts from the page named and linked beside it. Each answer was checked on 2026-10-03 against that page, fetched that day: the Potato Facts and Figures page of the International Potato Center (https://cipotato.org, published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License) for the questions on the crop itself, and the English Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org, text under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license) for the history, the dishes and the words. This site is not affiliated with the International Potato Center. Left out on purpose: harvest figures and rankings of countries, which change every year, anything about diet or health, and the story of the first potatoes grown in space, which we could not read on a page of the space agency. Not repeated here: the potato as an underground stem, the nightshade family, poutine, latkes, colcannon and the Idaho license plate, which other quizzes on this site already ask. Levels are our estimate: easy is fair for any table, medium suits a keen cook or gardener, hard will stump most of them. Each round is stored easiest first, and each question carries the date its page was read. Licence: own work