

Plus the freezing — you need ice crystals to form so they rupture the cell walls, and let the water flow out. That’s why chuño was originally made around those times (June, July) and in high altitude fields, to increase the odds the taters would freeze through the night and thaw back in the morning.
Even better than bread and beer storage of grains, and potatoes are more nutritious than either, to boot.
Yup. At least in raw calories. I think potatoes have a lower protein content, but that (and fat) can be supplemented with some dried meat, legumes, fresh veggies and fruits.
That said they did have maize beer; called chicha de jora (Spanish) / aqa (Quechua). But it was more for the booze during festivals than as calorie storage.












And now we got the Shitennou of weird Linux distros!