50 Fun Facts About American Food

Buffalo wings were first fried up in 1964 at which Buffalo, New York bar?

Teressa Bellissimo, who owned the bar with her husband Frank, is credited with the idea. The classic sauce is Frank's RedHot, butter and vinegar, and the wings have nothing to do with the animal.

What did Pat and Harry Olivieri sell from their stand before inventing the Philly cheesesteak?

Pat's King of Steaks still operates, and its customers overwhelmingly pick Cheez Whiz over American or provolone. You order 'wit' or 'witout' onions.

The Caesar salad, a fixture of American menus, was actually created on July 4, 1924 in which city?

Italian immigrant Caesar Cardini ran a restaurant there serving Americans dodging Prohibition. His daughter insisted the original had Worcestershire sauce but no anchovies.

Which company introduced Spam on July 5, 1937?

Ken Daigneau, the brother of an executive, won $100 for the name. Hawaii buys about seven million cans a year, and there is a Spam Museum in Austin, Minnesota.

Which US state has the highest per-capita consumption of Spam, at around seven million cans a year?

Spam musubi, a slice of the meat on rice wrapped in nori, is a local staple. The military took delivery of over 150 million pounds of it during World War II.

In which country did Ignacio Anaya invent nachos in 1943 for US military wives from Fort Duncan?

He fried tortilla triangles, topped them with shredded Colby cheese and pickled jalapeños, and called them 'Nacho's Special' after his own nickname. October 21 is the International Day of the Nacho.

Deep-dish pizza was invented in 1943 at which Windy City restaurant?

Founders Ike Sewell and Richard Riccardo get the credit, though their chef Rudy Malnati may deserve it. The cheese goes under the chunky tomato sauce, not on top.

White Castle, credited as the first fast-food hamburger chain, opened in 1921 in which city?

Billy Ingram and Walter Anderson started with $700 and sold their square sliders for five cents. Time magazine named the slider the most influential burger of all time in 2014.

Fortune cookies most likely originated with immigrants to America from which country?

Claimants include Makoto Hagiwara of San Francisco's Japanese Tea Garden and David Jung of Los Angeles. When the biggest US maker tried selling them in China in 1992 they were rejected as too American.

Which dessert did Florida designate its official state pie in 2006?

A proper one is pale yellow, not green, because ripe Key limes are yellow. In 1965 a state legislator proposed a $100 fine for anyone advertising a version made without Key limes; the bill failed.

The banana split was created in 1904 by a 23-year-old pharmacy apprentice in which Pennsylvania town?

David 'Doc' Strickler's original had one scoop each of vanilla, chocolate and strawberry. Wilmington, Ohio disputes the claim, but the National Ice Cream Retailers Association sided with Pennsylvania in 2004.

Per the Omaha origin story, the Reuben sandwich was invented for a poker game at which establishment?

New York's Arnold Reuben of Reuben's Delicatessen has a rival claim. Because it pairs corned beef with Swiss cheese, the sandwich is not kosher despite its deli pedigree.

The Cobb salad is named after the owner of which Hollywood restaurant?

Robert Howard Cobb supposedly threw it together from kitchen leftovers late one night in 1937. The chopped ingredients are laid out in neat rows.

Roughly how many hot dogs do Americans eat each year?

About a third are eaten in summer. Charles Feltman started boiling sausages from a cart on Coney Island in 1867, and Joey Chestnut's contest record is 83 in ten minutes.

Which condiment is famously never put on a Chicago-style hot dog 'dragged through the garden'?

A proper Chicago dog gets mustard, tomatoes, onions, sport peppers, bright green relish, a pickle spear and celery salt on a poppy-seed bun.

North of the US border, corn dogs are commonly known by which brand name?

Back in the US, Cozy Dog Drive-In in Springfield, Illinois claims the first corn dog on a stick in 1946, while Pronto Pup in Oregon dates its claim to 1939.

Which frozen-food company created Tater Tots in 1953 to use up leftover slivers of cut potato?

Founders Nephi and Golden Grigg found the name in a thesaurus. In Minnesota the tots go on top of a ground-beef casserole known as hotdish.

In which state is barbecue almost exclusively pork, with vinegar sauce in the east and mustard further south?

Whole-hog Carolina barbecue is considered the starting point of the whole American tradition. Kansas City goes thick and tomato-based across beef, pork and lamb; Central Texas is all about brisket.

Which barbecue city is best known for pork ribs served either 'wet' or 'dry'?

Dry means a spice rub with no sauce; wet means basted before and after cooking. Memphians also put pulled pork on things like pizza and nachos.

In Cincinnati's famous parlors, what does ordering a 'three-way' get you?

Add onions or beans for a four-way, both for a five-way. The Kiradjieff brothers, immigrants from Macedonia, started serving it in 1922 with a cinnamon-and-allspice-spiced sauce.

Which ingredient, widely rumoured to be in Cincinnati chili, is not actually used by any of the city's parlors?

The real warm-spice profile comes from cinnamon, allspice, cloves, cumin and nutmeg. Skyline and Gold Star are the two big chains.

Which US president served 'a pie called macaroni' at a state dinner in 1802?

His enslaved chef James Hemings may have picked up the recipe in France. Kraft's boxed version arrived in 1937 promising a meal for four in nine minutes.

Which country buys nearly a quarter of the Kraft macaroni and cheese sold worldwide?

There it is called Kraft Dinner, and one writer has argued it outranks poutine as the national dish.

Green bean casserole was created in 1955 in whose corporate test kitchen?

Dorcas Reilly's recipe now accounts for about 40 percent of all cream of mushroom soup sold in the US. She donated the original recipe card to the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2002.

Since 1989, what traditionally happens to the turkey presented to the president each November?

The pardoned birds are sent off to live out their usually short natural lives at a farm or park. Americans spent $983 million on Thanksgiving turkeys in 2024.

What flavour was the original Twinkie filling when James Dewar invented the snack cake in 1930?

Wartime banana rationing forced a switch to vanilla that stuck. The name came from a St. Louis billboard for Twinkle Toe Shoes.

The Oreo, launched by Nabisco in 1912, was an imitation of which earlier cream-filled sandwich cookie?

Sunshine's original dates to 1908 but lost the war for shelf space. Oreo has been the world's best-selling cookie brand since 2014, and Double Stuf arrived in 1974.

Cracker Jack was first shown to the public at a world's fair in which city in 1893?

Brothers Frederick and Louis Rueckheim made it; the prize in every box started in 1912 and Sailor Jack and his dog Bingo arrived around 1916. Food historian Andrew F. Smith calls it the first junk food.

In what year did Cracker Jack start putting a prize in every box?

Physical toys were replaced with digital game codes in 2016. The snack had already been immortalised in 'Take Me Out to the Ball Game'.

Which style of clam chowder is made with a clear broth, containing no milk, butter or tomatoes?

New England's is cream-based, Manhattan's is red with tomatoes, and all three usually come with oyster crackers.

Which dish did the Louisiana legislature name the state's official cuisine in 2004?

Its name comes from West African words for okra, one of its three possible thickeners along with roux and filé powder. Gumbo z'herbes is the meatless Lenten version.

What three vegetables make up the 'holy trinity' at the base of gumbo and Cajun cooking?

It is the Louisiana answer to the French mirepoix, with bell pepper standing in for carrot.

The Hot Brown, an open-faced turkey sandwich in Mornay sauce, was created in 1926 in which city?

Fred K. Schmidt devised it at the Brown Hotel as a late-night alternative to ham and eggs for dance guests. It soon became the choice of 95% of the restaurant's customers.

General Tso's chicken is named after a statesman from which Chinese province, where the dish is unknown?

Chef Peng Chang-kuei introduced it in New York around 1973 in a sweeter form for American tastes. When he opened a restaurant back home in the 1990s, locals found it too sweet.

Which was the only apple native to North America when European colonists arrived?

Apple pie itself was first recorded in medieval Europe. In some American dairy regions a slice is often served with sharp cheddar.

New Orleans po' boys reportedly got their name in 1929 when the Martin brothers fed strikers from which trade for free?

Bennie and Clovis Martin were former conductors themselves. Order one 'dressed' and it comes with shredded lettuce, tomato, pickles and mayonnaise.

Chili con carne became the official state dish of which state in 1977?

San Antonio's 'chili queens' sold it from open-air stands in the 1880s, and the San Antonio Chili Stand at the 1893 Chicago fair gave many Americans their first taste. Competition chili there is made without beans.

By the most repeated origin story, the ice cream cone went mainstream at the 1904 World's Fair in which city?

Syrian concessionaire Ernest Hamwi supposedly rolled a waffle into a cup when a neighbouring ice cream seller ran out of dishes. An English cookbook had printed a cornet recipe back in 1888.

The earliest known recipe for potato chips appeared in 1817 in a cookbook published in which country?

William Kitchiner's The Cook's Oracle predates the beloved tale of George Crum inventing chips at Saratoga Springs in 1853, which historians now regard as a myth.

The first written recipe for s'mores appeared in a 1927 handbook published by which organisation?

The name is simply a contraction of 'some more'. August 10 is National S'mores Day.

Ruth Wakefield created the Toll House cookie in the 1930s at an inn in which state?

For her deal with Nestlé she said she was promised a dollar; some versions add a lifetime supply of chocolate. The state made it the official cookie in 1997.

Louis' Lunch in New Haven claims to have served the first hamburger when Louis Lassen ran out of what?

He grilled ground beef trimmings and put the patty between two slices of toast. Rival claims come from Wisconsin, Texas and Hamburg, New York, all dated to the 1880s.

In which state did Charlie Nagreen, a claimant to inventing the hamburger, first sell it at a fair in 1885?

He was 15 and flattened a meatball between bread so customers at the Seymour Fair could eat while walking. Seymour still calls itself the Home of the Hamburger.

How much did Ken Daigneau win in 1937 for coming up with the name Spam?

He was the brother of a Hormel executive. The company has never confirmed that the name is short for 'spiced ham', and the Monty Python sketch later gave the word its email meaning.

Which Hostess snack cake returned to US shelves in July 2013, eight months after its maker's bankruptcy?

Hostess had shut down in November 2012. The 'Twinkie defense' remains legal slang for an implausible excuse.

The first published mention of a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, in 1901, appeared in which periodical?

Julia Davis Chandler suggested it as a tea sandwich; it became a Depression staple and a WWII soldiers' meal.

Which state named grits its official prepared food in 2002?

A similar bill in South Carolina never advanced, though the Lowcountry is famed for shrimp and grits.

Which dessert did Texas legislators name the state's pie in 2013?

No recipe older than an 1886 Harper's Bazaar pecan custard pie has been found; Karo syrup's makers popularised the modern version.

The soul-food version of chicken and waffles took off after which Harlem venue opened in 1938?

The dish began as a Pennsylvania Dutch meal of stewed chicken and gravy over a plain waffle in the 1600s.

The lobster roll is commonly credited to a restaurant called Perry's in which Connecticut town, as early as 1929?

Some New England versions swap the butter for mayonnaise; a chef at Johnson & Wales credits English and Portuguese fishermen instead.