[...] One study suggests that doses of 2 to 5 mg/kg of body weight can cause toxic symptoms, and doses of 3 to 6 mg/kg of body weight can be fatal.[5][...]
Safety / Suggested limits on consumption of solanine
The average consumption of potatoes in the U.S. is estimated to be about 167 g of potatoes per day per person.[11] There is variation in glycoalkaloid levels in different types of potatoes, but potato farmers aim to keep solanine levels below 0.2 mg/g.[18] Signs of solanine poisoning have been linked to eating potatoes with solanine concentrations of between 0.1 and 0.4 mg per gram of potato.[18] The average potato has 0.075 mg solanine/g potato, which is equal to about 0.18 mg/kg based on average daily potato consumption.[19]
Calculations have shown that 2 to 5 mg/kg of body weight is the likely toxic dose of glycoalkaloids like solanine in humans, with 3 to 6 mg/kg constituting the fatal dose.[20] Other studies have shown that symptoms of toxicity were observed with consumption of even 1 mg/kg.[11]
If 0.18 mg/kg = 167 g of Potatoes, then 1 g/kg is reached at 927g of potatoes, which equals about 800 calories. So if you “eat as much as you want”, I’m not surprised at all if people show solanine poisoning symptoms.
(And that’s still ignoring probable accumulation over prolonged time of high consumption.)
The more I think about it, the more I wonder if boiling the potatoes infused them with the peels and increased significantly the quantity of solanine I was consuming. An obvious confounder is that whole-boiled potatoes are less fun to eat than in more varied forms, so it doesn’t discriminate with the “fun food” theory
Thanks a lot for the estimate, I’ll look into recent studies of this to see what I find!
Re solanine poisoning, just based on what’s written in Wikipedia:
If 0.18 mg/kg = 167 g of Potatoes, then 1 g/kg is reached at 927g of potatoes, which equals about 800 calories. So if you “eat as much as you want”, I’m not surprised at all if people show solanine poisoning symptoms.
(And that’s still ignoring probable accumulation over prolonged time of high consumption.)
The more I think about it, the more I wonder if boiling the potatoes infused them with the peels and increased significantly the quantity of solanine I was consuming. An obvious confounder is that whole-boiled potatoes are less fun to eat than in more varied forms, so it doesn’t discriminate with the “fun food” theory
Thanks a lot for the estimate, I’ll look into recent studies of this to see what I find!