Sweet potatoes originated in Central and South America, but they managed to travel across the Pacific by 1000 AD.
This is a curious fact that scientists have uncovered through plant DNA studies. It seems that Europeans, from Christopher Columbus' 1492 voyage onward, were responsible for many of the food transfers between continents. After Columbus, it took just over 50 years for the tomato, a native of Peru, to reach Italy where the sauce-loving Italians were recommending it be fried in oil with salt and pepper, according to Laphams Quarterly. (The British thought tomatoes smelled and were poisonous.)
But, 400 years before Columbus, the sweet potato managed to travel 5,000 miles across the Pacific from South America to Polynesia, according to research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
How did that happen?
The sea-faring Polynesians may have accomplished the daunting voyage, which would have been like traveling to the moon without knowing the moon was there. The voyage would have taken months.
DNA research suggests the Polynesians landed on the west coast of South America and took some sweet potatoes home. They also may have left chickens in South America, possibly explaining why there were chickens in western Peru shortly before the arrival of Columbus.
Critics of this explanation abound, but there is also some linguistic evidence. One Polynesian word for sweet potato — Kuumala — sounds a lot like Kumara, the word for vegetable in the Andean language Quechua.
