North AmericanBritish
Butter Tart History: The Two-Line Barrie Recipe of 1900
The earliest printed butter tart recipe is a two-line filling in a 1900 hospital fundraiser cookbook from Barrie, Ontario. Everything before it is theory.
6 min read
North American Stories
Every PlateTales food history story tagged North American, newest first.
20 stories · All stories
JapaneseNorth AmericanWar & Famine
Why Is Spam So Popular in Hawaii? Start With the Fishing Ban
GIs brought the cans, but martial law kept Hawaii's Japanese fishermen ashore in 1941, and a plantation habit of rice with salty canned meat gave Spam somewhere to stay.
8 min read
North AmericanInventions
Who Invented the Brownie? The Palmer House Claim Tested
Chicago's Palmer House says it made the first brownie for the 1893 World's Fair. The printed record shows a molasses cake in 1896 and chocolate recipes after 1900.
6 min read
North AmericanMigrationChinese
Why Jews Eat Chinese Food on Christmas, and Since When
In 1899 a New York Jewish weekly scolded readers for eating in Chinese restaurants. By 1935 chow mein was arriving at a Newark children's home on Christmas Day.
9 min read
JapaneseNorth AmericanMigration
Where Did Fortune Cookies Come From? Japan, via California
The fortune cookie began as a Japanese cracker with a paper slip in its fold. Japanese bakers made it American, and internment in 1942 handed it to Chinese restaurants.
8 min read
North AmericanCross-CulturalEuropean
Who Invented Mac and Cheese? Not Jefferson, and Not Kraft
Thomas Jefferson gets the credit and James Hemings gets the correction, but Richard II's master cooks wrote the dish down around 1390, centuries before either man was born.
9 min read
North AmericanInventionsModern
The Origin of Pecan Pie Was a Custard, Long Before Karo
The first pecan pie in print dates to February 1886 and was a milk custard with boiled nuts. The syrup pie, the New Orleans legend and the Karo story all came later.
9 min read
North AmericanInventionsMexican
Who Invented the Caesar Salad? Four Men and a Tijuana Kitchen
Caesar Cardini of Tijuana has the best claim to the Caesar salad, but the famous July 4, 1924 date surfaced decades later, and three other men said the bowl was theirs.
9 min read
North AmericanInventionsModern
Who Invented Green Bean Casserole? She Didn't Remember
Dorcas Reilly put green bean casserole together in a Campbell's test kitchen in 1955. Fifty years on, she told a reporter she could not recall doing it.
8 min read
North AmericanInventionsMexican
Who Invented Nachos? Ignacio Anaya and the 1940 Paper Trail
Ignacio "Nacho" Anaya melted cheese over fried tortillas for four women from Eagle Pass, Texas. His own newspaper interviews say it happened in 1940, three years before the usual date.
9 min read
North AmericanTrade RoutesColonialism
The History of Pumpkin Spice Has Almost No Pumpkin in It
Pumpkin spice is the seasoning for a pumpkin pie, not a flavor made from one. Its paper trail runs from a 1796 Hartford cookbook to 1930s spice tins to a 2003 latte.
8 min read
North AmericanInventionsModern
Why Candy Corn Was Called Chicken Feed, and Who Said So
Goelitz sold candy corn as Chicken Feed, rooster on the package, to a country that fed corn to livestock. October ads for it only spiked in the 1950s.
8 min read
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