191 Fun Facts About Food

Which spice is the hand-picked, dried stigma of a crocus?

Saffron is the stigma of Crocus sativus; each flower bears just three, so about 150 flowers must be hand-picked for a single gram of the dried spice.

Which blue-veined Italian cheese is named after a town near Milan?

Gorgonzola is named after its home town north-east of Milan; cheesemakers pierce each wheel with metal rods so air reaches the Penicillium mould and the blue veins grow.

Which kitchen verb means simmering a sauce, stock or wine so water evaporates and the flavour thickens and intensifies?

Reduce is also how maple syrup is made: roughly 40 litres of sap are boiled down to get a single litre of syrup.

Which fruit is botanically classified as a berry, despite its common culinary perception?

Bananas are botanical berries because each fruit grows from one flower's single ovary, with no stone around its seeds; strawberries are not, since their flesh grows from the flower's receptacle.

Which Valencian dish takes its name from the wide, shallow pan it is cooked in?

Paella is Valencian for 'frying pan'; farm labourers likely first cooked it in the Albufera rice fields with what was at hand, such as snails and water birds.

What is the main ingredient in hummus?

Chickpeas, cooked and mashed, are hummus's base; from Egypt to the Levant, diners scoop it up with flatbread such as pita.

Which East Asian mushroom is named in Japanese for the tree whose dead logs it grows on?

Shiitake means 'shii-tree mushroom'; eaten raw or lightly cooked, it can rarely cause shiitake dermatitis, an itchy rash of streaks like whiplash marks.

Ghee is commonly used in which cuisine?

Indian cooks rely on ghee, which is also poured into the sacred fire as an offering in Hindu homa rituals.

Edomae sushi is named after the old name of which city?

Tokyo was called Edo until 1868, when it was renamed 'eastern capital' and the emperor moved his residence there from Kyoto.

What grain is couscous traditionally made from?

Wheat semolina is sprinkled with water and rolled by hand into tiny pellets, which are then steamed above the simmering stew.

Which thorny Southeast Asian fruit is nicknamed the 'king of fruits'?

Durian's smell can linger for days, so Singapore's metro and some Southeast Asian hotels ban the fruit.

Which technique finishes crêpes Suzette at the table?

Flambéing ignites the liqueur in the sauce; by one disputed account, crêpes Suzette began when a teenage Henri Charpentier's sauce caught fire by accident as he served the Prince of Wales.

In Japanese cuisine, what is mirin?

Mirin is a sweet rice wine whose sugars give teriyaki its glossy glaze; the 'teri' in teriyaki means shine.

What traditional French pastry is made from choux dough and often filled with cream?

Éclair means 'flash of lightning', reputedly because it is eaten so quickly; until about 1850 the pastry was called pain à la duchesse.

Which fruit only starts to ripen once it is picked?

Avocado growers owe the Hass variety to a single tree in Rudolph Hass's California garden: every Hass tree descends from it.

What chemical compound is primarily responsible for the sensation of heat in chili peppers?

Capsaicin triggers the TRPV1 heat receptor in mammals, causing the burn; birds lack that sensitivity, so they eat the peppers and spread the seeds.

Which nut is primarily used to make marzipan?

Almonds, ground with sugar, make marzipan; cheaper persipan swaps in apricot or peach kernels and often carries a little starch so an iodine test can tell the two apart.

Fresh Italian pasta is usually made from flour and which ingredient, unlike dried pasta?

Eggs go into fresh pasta, while Italian law requires plain dried pasta made and sold in Italy to be only durum semolina and water.

What is a roux typically made of?

Flour and fat, cooked together, make a roux; the longer it cooks, the darker and nuttier it gets but the less it can thicken, as with a near-chocolate gumbo roux.

What type of fish is most commonly used for traditional British fish and chips?

Cod is traditionally the first choice, and fish and chips was one of the few British foods never rationed during the Second World War.

What is kombucha primarily made from?

Fermented sweetened tea is what kombucha is made from: the culture, nicknamed the tea mushroom, eats the sugar and leaves a sour, lightly fizzy drink thought to have originated in China.

What is the traditional Japanese fermented soybean paste often used in soup?

Miso is soybeans fermented with salt and koji mould; during the Sengoku civil wars, soldiers relied on it as field rations.

Which vegetable is known as aubergine in some parts of the world?

Eggplant is the nightshade Solanum melongena; the name first described white cultivars that look very much like hen's eggs.

Sauerkraut's sourness comes from which acid, made by bacteria already living on raw cabbage leaves as they ferment it?

Lactic acid bacteria are naturally present on cabbage, so sauerkraut needs no added culture, only salt; the same family of microbes sours yogurt.

What is the main ingredient in polenta?

Cornmeal only became polenta's base after maize reached Italy from the Americas; before that, polenta was made from grains such as farro.

What is the outer layer of citrus fruit, rich in aromatic oils, called when used for flavor?

Zest is the coloured outer peel of citrus, above the white pith; rubbing it into sugar draws out its oils to flavour baking.

What is the primary ingredient in pesto sauce?

Basil is pesto's heart, crushed with pine nuts, garlic, cheese and oil; Genoa even holds a world championship where the sauce must be made in a mortar.

Which US city is so tied to sourdough that a sourdough bacterium was named after it?

San Francisco names the sourdough bacterium Fructilactobacillus sanfranciscensis, which feeds on maltose while the starter's yeast prefers other sugars, so the two don't compete.

What is tahini primarily made from?

Sesame seeds make tahini: they are soaked to soften their hulls, which are separated off in water before the kernels are toasted and ground.

Traditional baked beans are usually made from which bean variety, also called haricot?

Navy beans, the small white haricot, are the classic baked bean, yet canned 'baked beans' are not actually baked: they are cooked sealed in the can.

Which spice's oil is dabbed on aching teeth?

Cloves' oil is mostly eugenol, which dentists mix with zinc oxide to make a temporary filling cement.

Granita, a semi-frozen dessert of sugar, water and flavourings, originated on which Italian island?

Sicily is granita's home; the mixture is stirred as it freezes, so it sets into a soft mass of many tiny ice crystals.

What is the main ingredient in balsamic vinegar?

Grapes are the base: traditional balsamic is cooked grape must aged for years in wooden casks in Modena and Reggio Emilia, and it was once taken as a medicine for sore throats.

Botanically, which of these fruits is a drupe?

A cherry is a drupe, as are olives and mangoes; even coffee 'beans' are really the seeds of a drupe, the red coffee cherry.

Tempeh, a compact cake of fermented soybeans, is a traditional food of which country?

Indonesia, especially Java, is tempeh's home; instead of curdling soy milk as for tofu, it lets Rhizopus mould knit whole soybeans into a firm cake.

Which small fish is a key fermented ingredient in Worcestershire sauce?

Anchovies go into it with vinegar and molasses; Lea & Perrins' first batch was reputedly set aside as unpalatable and found, after long ageing, to have mellowed.

Which cooking method browns meat at high heat, then simmers it slowly in a covered pot of liquid?

Braising pairs a hot sear with a slow, covered simmer that breaks down collagen and connective tissue, so tough cuts turn tender.

What is tapioca made from?

Cassava root holds compounds that release cyanide, so it must be soaked, grated or cooked before eating; tapioca is the starch extracted from it.

Egyptian falafel, known locally as ta'ameya, is traditionally made from which legume?

Broad beans make Egypt's ta'ameya; some historians think Copts first made falafel as a meatless dish for their fasts.

Which Spanish small plates, one story says, began as bread or ham laid over a drink to keep out flies?

Tapas come from tapar, 'to cover'; one legend says King Alfonso X, recovering from an illness, took his drink with small bites, then ordered taverns to serve drink only with a snack.

Which stock is the base of many Japanese soups and simmered dishes?

Dashi is usually kombu and bonito flakes, shaved from katsuobushi: skipjack tuna simmered, smoked and fermented until it resembles a piece of wood.

Which hot chili pepper paste comes from Tunisia?

Harissa owes its heat to chili peppers from the Americas, probably brought to Tunisia during the Spanish occupation of 1535–1574.

Which dried fruit's laxative effect is linked to sorbitol?

Prunes are simply dried plums; their sorbitol is poorly absorbed, so it draws water into the large intestine.

Kimchi is most often made from which salted and fermented vegetable?

Napa cabbage is the usual base; kimchi was once stored in earthenware crocks buried in the ground, and many homes now keep a dedicated kimchi refrigerator.

Which preservation process uses salt, often with sugar and nitrates, to draw moisture from meat?

Curing's nitrites give cured meats such as ham their pink colour by binding to the iron in the meat's myoglobin.

In Argentina and Uruguay, which dish is traditionally eaten on the 29th of each month, with money tucked under the plate?

Gnocchi gave Argentine and Uruguayan slang 'ñoqui', a worker who shows up only at the end of the month to collect a salary.

Which city gives its name to the bitter oranges prized for British marmalade?

Seville oranges are rarely eaten locally; each year the fruit is shipped to Britain, where its high pectin gives marmalade a firm set.

Hollandaise is an emulsion of egg yolk, lemon juice and which melted fat?

Butter has to go in over gentle heat, because hollandaise curdles if it gets too hot and splits easily if reheated.

The Maillard reaction that browns a bread crust happens when sugars combine at high heat with what?

Amino acids, especially asparagine, can also react with sugars in the same browning to form acrylamide, a possible human carcinogen.

Only licensed chefs may prepare fugu pufferfish in Japan because it carries which lethal poison, with no known antidote?

Tetrodotoxin can paralyse victims while they stay conscious, so treatment means keeping them breathing until the body clears the poison.

Iceland's fermented dish hákarl is made from which shark, poisonous when fresh?

Greenland shark flesh is poisonous fresh because of its high urea and trimethylamine oxide, so it is traditionally buried to ferment for weeks, then hung to dry for months.

Kopi luwak coffee is made from beans that have passed through which animal's digestive tract?

Asian palm civets digest the fruit's pulp but not the beans; demand has led farms to keep civets in small battery cages.

Casu martzu, a traditional Sardinian cheese, is notorious for containing what?

Live fly maggots, larvae of the cheese fly Piophila casei, break down the cheese's fats, turning it into a soft, pungent cream.

Which Swedish fermented Baltic herring is sold in tins that bulge as it keeps fermenting?

Surströmming gets just enough salt to keep the raw herring from rotting while it ferments, and the smell is so strong that tins are usually opened outdoors.

Mace, the spice, is the lacy red aril around the seed of which other spice?

Nutmeg is the seed and mace its lacy covering; in large doses nutmeg is toxic and psychoactive, with effects that can last for days.

Despite its name, Bombay duck is what kind of food?

A dried fish: Bombay duck is a lizardfish that, under British colonial rule, became a condiment served with curries.

What did Wilbur Scoville's 1912 test of pepper heat rely on?

Human tasters sampled an extract diluted in sugar water until the burn vanished, so results varied from one palate to the next.

Nixtamalization, soaking maize in alkali, helps prevent which deficiency disease?

Pellagra, the niacin-deficiency disease, is prevented because the alkali makes maize's niacin usable; where maize spread without this step, as in the US South, pellagra became endemic.

The French dessert omelette norvégienne is known in English by what name?

Baked Alaska is ice cream on sponge, sealed in meringue and browned briefly in a very hot oven; the meringue insulates the ice cream from the heat.

Chemist Kikunae Ikeda found glutamate in kombu seaweed and named which taste?

Umami was Ikeda's name for glutamate's savoury taste; he then patented monosodium glutamate and sold it under the brand Ajinomoto.

Which Swiss cheese's famous holes, researchers found, form around tiny specks of hay dust in the milk?

Emmental's holes form where bacteria release gas around hay specks, so cleaner modern milking has left the cheese with fewer and smaller holes.

The United States barred imports of traditional haggis because of a ban on food containing which ingredient?

Sheep lung is part of the traditional recipe, so haggis sold in the US is an adapted, lung-free version made there.

Which island group includes Run, the spice island given up in exchange for Manhattan?

The Banda Islands stayed the world's only supplier of their spices until the mid-19th century, which is why tiny Run was worth trading for Manhattan.

Tabasco pepper mash is aged up to three years in white oak barrels previously used for what?

Whiskey barrels hold the mash, and pickers check each pepper's ripeness against a little red stick, le petit bâton rouge.

Legend says the pizza created by Raffaele Esposito in 1889 honoured a visiting whom?

Queen Margherita of Savoy is said to have favoured Esposito's red, white and green pizza, echoing Italy's flag, though historians doubt the story.

Restaurateur Caesar Cardini reputedly invented Caesar salad in which city?

Tijuana, Mexico, drew Americans evading Prohibition to Cardini's restaurant, and his daughter said he improvised the salad there when a Fourth of July rush in 1924 emptied the kitchen.

What did John Montagu, an 18th-century earl, reportedly order during long card games?

Roast beef between two pieces of toast is the gambling-table tale told by traveller Pierre-Jean Grosley; the Earl's biographer thinks he more likely ate at his desk.

The croissant was inspired by the shape of which Austrian pastry?

Kipferl, a crescent roll documented in Vienna by 1227, reached Paris through August Zang's Viennese bakery, and French bakers later remade it with laminated dough.

Bagels were first mentioned in 1610 in community ordinances of which Polish city?

Kraków's Jewish community regulations of 1610 are the first written mention, listing bagels as a gift for women in childbirth; the rings are briefly boiled, then baked.

Which twisted bread does a popular story say an Italian monk shaped to look like arms folded in prayer?

Pretzel's name may come from Latin for 'little arms', and in the tale the monk handed them to students as 'pretiola', little rewards.

Which German city's sausages were a speciality served at Holy Roman Emperors' coronations?

Frankfurt-trained butcher Johann Georg Lahner began selling sausages in Vienna in 1805, reputedly why Austrians call wieners 'Frankfurters'.

Which US president served 'potatoes in the French manner' at a White House dinner?

Thomas Jefferson kept a handwritten recipe for potatoes fried raw in small slices, probably from his French chef, Honoré Julien.

Which Mexican sauce, often blending chili peppers, nuts and spices, can run to 20 or more ingredients?

Mole comes from Nahuatl mōlli, 'sauce'; legend says convent nuns in Puebla invented mole poblano to impress an important visitor.

Ramen's story usually starts in which Japanese city's Chinatown, the country's largest?

Yokohama's Chinatown saw Chinese immigrants serve noodles in broth around the turn of the 20th century; after the Second World War, flour was easier to get than rice, so ramen stalls boomed.

Which Vietnamese noodle soup was born in the north around 1900?

Pho's beef came with French rule: cattle had been work animals, and street vendors began using cheap beef scraps as the French created demand.

Korean bibimbap, meaning 'mixed rice', is topped with namul vegetables and which fermented red chili paste?

Gochujang is traditionally fermented in earthenware crocks called jangdok, whose porous walls let the paste breathe as it ferments.

Tacos al pastor derive from lamb shawarma brought to Puebla by immigrants from where?

Immigrants from Lebanon brought shawarma to Mexico; swapping lamb for pork and adding an adobo marinade and pineapple turned it into al pastor.

Ceviche is recognized by UNESCO as an expression of which country's traditional cuisine?

Peru's ceviche is raw fish in lime juice, whose acid denatures the proteins so the flesh turns opaque and firm as if cooked.

Which ingredient, prized for squeaking against the teeth when fresh, goes on a classic poutine?

Cheese curds lose much of their squeak within a day, even refrigerated, which is why a proper poutine needs curds fresh from the dairy.

Which curry's tomato-soup origin story did restaurateur Iqbal Wahhab later admit he made up?

Chicken tikka masala: Wahhab and food historian Peter Grove invented the Campbell's soup tale for journalists, betting they wouldn't check it.

Goulash, seasoned with paprika, originated in which country?

Hungary: goulash is named after the gulyás, the cattle herders who cooked it in iron kettles over open fires while out with their herds.

Borscht began as a soup of pickled hogweed; which vegetable later replaced it?

Beetroot turned the soup red, yet borscht still carries the old Slavic name for hogweed, the plant it pushed out of the pot.

Greek chef Nikolaos Tselementes gave which baked dish its béchamel topping?

Moussaka: Tselementes's cookbooks shaped Greek home cooking so thoroughly that his surname became a Greek synonym for 'cookbook'.

Shakshouka, eggs poached in tomato sauce, is a dish from which region?

The Maghreb: Jewish emigrants from the region, notably Tunisia and Algeria, carried shakshouka to Israel, where it was widely adopted.

Ethiopian injera flatbread is traditionally made from which grain?

Teff, a tiny Ethiopian grain, is ground and fermented for injera, giving the spongy sour flatbread that doubles as plate and utensil.

Unlike jerky, how is South African biltong traditionally prepared?

Air-dried: with no heat to kill bacteria, biltong relies on its vinegar marinade, since botulism bacteria can't grow in acidic conditions.

Cheddar cheese is named after a village in which county?

Somerset: the caves of Cheddar Gorge, with their steady temperature and humidity, were ideal for maturing the cheese that took the village's name.

Which cheese has Italian bank Credito Emiliano taken as loan collateral, storing the wheels in its warehouses?

Parmesan: at 12 months a master grader taps each wheel with a small hammer to find hidden cracks, and failing wheels can lose their markings.

Which two towns lend their names to the only officially certified French bries?

Meaux and Melun: Talleyrand is said to have had Brie de Meaux crowned 'king of cheeses' at the Congress of Vienna in 1815.

Which cheese's name did the EU reserve for Greece after Germany and Denmark argued it had become generic?

Feta: the EU Court of Justice dismissed their challenge in 2005, so only cheese from designated regions of Greece may use the name.

Naan is traditionally baked by pressing the dough against the inner walls of which oven?

Tandoor: its walls can reach about 480 °C, so the pressed dough bakes within minutes and picks up its spotty browning.

Which dessert do Italy's Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia regions both claim to have invented?

Tiramisu: in 2017 Italy's agriculture ministry entered it on Friuli-Venezia Giulia's official list of traditional food products.

Which meringue dessert, claimed by two neighbouring countries, is named after a Russian ballerina?

Pavlova honours Anna Pavlova's 1920s tours, and vinegar and cornflour folded into the meringue give it a crisp shell and a soft middle.

Crème brûlée was introduced as 'Trinity cream' at a college of which university?

Cambridge: Trinity College called it 'burnt cream', yet the earliest known recipe, in a 1691 French cookbook, had cooks caramelise it with a red-hot fire shovel.

Macaron shells are made from ground nuts, sugar and what?

Egg whites: legend says two nuns sheltering in Nancy during the French Revolution paid their way by baking and selling macarons.

Ottoman sultans presented trays of baklava to which soldiers on the 15th of Ramadan?

The Janissaries, the sultan's elite infantry, carried trays of baklava from the Topkapı palace kitchens to their barracks in the Baklava Alayı, the baklava procession, every 15th of Ramadan.

Which rice is steamed and pounded with wooden mallets at Japanese New Year celebrations?

Mochigome, a glutinous short-grain rice, makes mochi so sticky that it has caused choking deaths in Japan, especially among the elderly.

Gulab jamun is made mainly from which ingredient?

Milk solids (khoya): the fried balls are named after the jamun, a dark fruit of similar size and shape, and 'gulab' after their rose-water syrup.

Quinoa is a pseudocereal botanically related to which two plants?

Spinach and amaranth share quinoa's family, Amaranthaceae; the seeds are coated in bitter saponins that must be rinsed off, and the crop originated in the Andes.

Which vegetable's name is the Italian plural for 'little sprouts'?

Broccoli, bred from wild cabbage in Italy, was once so unfamiliar elsewhere that it was called 'Italian asparagus'.

Genetic studies trace the cultivated potato to a single origin in which region?

Southern Peru and northwestern Bolivia gave the world the potato, but Europe grew it from so few varieties that blight could sweep through, as in Ireland's famine.

'True cinnamon', Cinnamomum verum, is native to which country?

Sri Lanka, formerly Ceylon, is the home of Cinnamomum verum, once classified as C. zeylanicum; most cinnamon sold worldwide is actually cassia, from related species.

An enslaved 12-year-old on Réunion worked out how to hand-pollinate which spice's flowers?

Vanilla: Edmond Albius's thumb-and-stick method made Réunion for a time the world's biggest vanilla supplier, yet he died in poverty in 1880.

Wasabi belongs to the same plant family as horseradish, mustard and which vegetable?

Kale: outside Japan, most 'wasabi' is really horseradish with mustard and green colouring, because true wasabi is scarce and hard to grow.

Truffle hunters largely switched to dogs from which animal, because it tends to eat what it finds?

Pigs: they find truffles by scent but try to eat or dig them up, while trained dogs find them without digging, so dogs took over.

Under French law, foie gras must be the liver of a duck or goose fattened by what method?

Gavage (force feeding): several countries, including Israel and Australia, ban the practice, yet France has declared foie gras part of its protected cultural heritage.

Traditional caviar comes from wild sturgeon in the Black Sea and which other sea?

The Caspian Sea, bordered by Russia and Iran, is caviar's heartland; beluga, ossetra and sevruga are the classic sturgeon types, and after wild stocks collapsed most caviar became farmed.

Pasteurisation now protects milk, but in the 1860s Louis Pasteur first heat-treated what to stop it spoiling?

Wine: Pasteur found that heating it briefly to about 50–60 °C killed the microbes that spoiled it, and he patented the method in 1865.

Nicolas Appert, whose method led to canned food, first sealed food not in tins but in what?

Glass jars: Appert corked and waxed them, then boiled them, and he never understood why it worked, since bacteriology did not yet exist.

Which frozen-food brand is named after the inventor who learned quick-freezing from Inuit fishermen in Labrador?

Birds Eye: in −40 °C air, freshly caught fish froze almost instantly, and Clarence Birdseye later sold his company and patents for $22 million.

Percy Spencer's first commercial microwave oven, sold in 1947, was called what?

The Radarange: Percy Spencer is said to have noticed a candy bar in his pocket melting beside the radar set he was working on.

In 1974, chef Georges Pralus found foie gras kept its shape and fat when cooked by which method?

Sous vide, French for 'under vacuum': the liver was sealed in plastic and cooked gently, and scientist Bruno Goussault later trained top chefs in the method.

Which chef ran elBulli, the Costa Brava restaurant named the world's best five times?

Ferran Adrià: rather than keep serving, he closed elBulli in 2011 and relaunched it as a foundation for culinary creativity.

The Michelin Guide was first published in 1900 by which company?

A tyre manufacturer: brothers André and Édouard Michelin gave the guide away free, hoping motorists would drive more and wear out their tyres.

Which Mars chocolate bar, launched in 1930, was named after a favourite family horse?

Snickers was sold in Britain and Ireland as Marathon until 1990, when Mars switched them to the global name.

Why did Henry Heinz choose 57 for his slogan?

His and his wife's lucky numbers: 5 was his and 7 hers, and the firm already sold more than 60 products when the slogan appeared in 1896.

Kellogg's was headquartered in which Michigan city?

Battle Creek: corn flakes grew out of John Harvey Kellogg's sanitarium there, and his brother Will Keith founded the cereal company in the city in 1906.

Nutella's maker Ferrero began as a bakery in which Italian town known for hazelnuts?

Alba: with cocoa scarce after the war, Pietro Ferrero stretched it with local hazelnuts, and the paste he sold in 1946 later became Nutella.

Which canned meat do the Vikings sing about in a 1970 Monty Python sketch?

Spam: the Vikings' endless chant drowns out all other talk, which is why floods of unwanted online messages were later named spam.

Oreo cookies were an imitation of which earlier cream-centred cookie from 1908?

Hydrox came out in 1908, and Oreo launched in 1912 as an imitation, then outsold it so thoroughly that many people now think Hydrox is the copy.

What form did chemist Fredric Baur give Pringles chips?

A saddle shape lets the chips stack in their tube without breaking, and Baur, who also designed that can, had some of his ashes buried in one.

Most theories place the origin of mayonnaise in Mahón, on which island?

Menorca's port of Mahón, taken by the Duke of Richelieu in 1756 during the Seven Years' War, is the origin claimed by most theories; his chef supposedly brought 'mahonnaise' back to Paris.

Huy Fong's rooster bottle made it famous in the US, but sriracha is named after a town in which country?

Thailand: Si Racha's La-Orr Suwanprasop began selling her chili sauce in 1932, but she couldn't register the town's name as a brand, so she sold it as 'Gold Medal'.

Tabasco sauce was first made in 1868 at which Louisiana location?

Avery Island, a salt dome, is where Edmund McIlhenny began making Tabasco in 1868, though its peppers came to be grown mainly in Central and South America and Africa.

Soy sauce in its current form dates from about 2,200 years ago in which Chinese dynasty?

The Western Han dynasty is believed to have made soy sauce as a byproduct of soybean paste, a cheaper stand-in for older meat and fish pastes.

Which country produced more olive oil than any other in 2022?

Spain: so many jars of oil were shipped from Roman Spain to Rome that their shards helped pile up a hill there, Monte Testaccio.

Thieves siphoned about C$18 million of maple syrup from a strategic reserve in which Canadian province?

Quebec: ringleader Richard Vallières was convicted of fraud, trafficking and theft, and Canada's Supreme Court later reinstated his multimillion-dollar fine.

Who is often wrongly credited with inventing peanut butter, though a Montreal man patented it first?

George Washington Carver: he urged Southern farmers to rotate cotton with peanuts, since legumes restore nitrogen to soil worn out by cotton.

When World War II sugar rationing cut candy supplies, Americans ate three times as much of which snack?

Popcorn: theater owners first resisted it, but in the Great Depression cinemas that sold the cheap snack thrived while those that refused lost out.

Dutch settlers brought which fried-dough treat, an ancestor of the doughnut, to New Amsterdam?

Olykoek, 'oil cake': these fried balls could stay raw inside, and a sailor, Hanson Gregory, later claimed he fixed that by punching a hole in the dough.

General Tso's chicken is named after a Qing general from which Chinese province?

Hunan was the home province of Qing statesman Zuo Zongtang, who never tasted the dish; chef Peng Chang-kuei created it in Taiwan in the 1950s.

Which Chinese-American dish's name comes from Cantonese words meaning 'odds and ends'?

Chop suey: a popular tale says it was invented during Qing premier Li Hongzhang's 1896 US visit, but historians have found no proof.

Which chef is credited with inventing nigiri sushi?

Hanaya Yohei: with no refrigeration, the fish for his nigiri was lightly cooked or marinated in soy sauce or vinegar to keep it from spoiling.

Which ingredient, first made commercially in New York in 1872, became the base of American cheesecake?

Cream cheese: William Lawrence added cream to a Neufchâtel-style cheese, and the 'Philadelphia' label came from a New York distributor, not the city.

Which British cheese did Wallace and Gromit help rescue when its sales collapsed in the 1990s?

Wensleydale: production had nearly stopped, but Wallace naming it his favourite cheese in A Close Shave revived sales and helped save the creamery.

Bouillabaisse was originally made by fishermen of which port city?

Marseille fishermen invented bouillabaisse to use the bony rockfish that restaurants and markets would not buy, which is why a poor man's pot became a pricey classic.

Ratatouille is particularly associated with which French city?

Nice: ratatouille began as a peasant way to use up surplus summer vegetables by stewing them together, and its name comes from Occitan ratatolha.

Which French cheese may bear its name only if it is aged in the natural caves of Mont Combalou?

Roquefort: legend says a shepherd left his bread and cheese in a cave to chase a girl, and came back months later to find it transformed by mould.

The modern watermelon originated in which country?

Sudan: genetic studies point to its Kordofan melon as the closest wild relative, overturning a long-held belief that watermelons came from southern Africa.

Europeans first came across the pineapple on Guadeloupe during which explorer's voyage?

Christopher Columbus: back in Europe, the fruit resisted cultivation until growers near Leiden raised it in greenhouses.

As of 2022, which country grew more cassava than any other?

Nigeria: raw cassava releases cyanide, so it is soaked, fermented or cooked before becoming staples such as garri and fufu.

Which tree yields both a nut and an 'apple' whose juice can be fermented into liquor?

Cashew trees bear the nut below a swollen 'apple', whose juice is fermented and distilled into feni in Goa; the shell holds irritant oils, so the nut is roasted or steamed first.

Which three countries grew most of the world's pistachios in the early 2020s?

United States, Iran and Turkey: pistachios are so oily that big stores can heat themselves and combust, especially if packed in jute.

Tempura's batter-frying technique reached Japan in the 16th century from which country?

Portugal: missionaries in 16th-century Nagasaki taught batter frying, and the name may come from Latin tempora, the fasting times when they ate fish instead of meat.

Kobe beef comes from Tajima-strain cattle raised in which Japanese prefecture?

Hyōgo: official exports of Kobe beef began only in 2012, partly to fight imitations sold abroad under its name.

Yorkshire pudding served as a first course is traditionally accompanied by what?

Onion gravy: serving the pudding first was meant to fill diners up on cheap batter so they would eat less of the costly meat.

Nachos were created in 1943 by restaurateur Ignacio Anaya in which Mexican border city?

Piedras Negras: when US Army wives turned up after hours, Ignacio 'Nacho' Anaya improvised fried tortilla pieces with cheese, and the dish took his nickname.

The Cobb salad is said to have been invented in 1937 at which Hollywood restaurant?

The Brown Derby's owner Robert Howard Cobb reportedly threw together leftovers near midnight in 1937, and the salad's neat rows of toppings became the restaurant's signature.

By one popular claim, Buffalo wings were first prepared in 1964 by Teressa Bellissimo at which establishment?

Anchor Bar: Teressa Bellissimo reputedly deep-fried the wings as a late-night snack for her son's friends, one of several origin stories.

Which Philadelphia brothers are usually credited with inventing the cheesesteak in the early 1930s?

Pat and Harry Olivieri, hot-dog vendors in South Philadelphia, grilled chopped beef on an Italian roll around 1930; Pat's King of Steaks grew from it, and cheese was added later.

A 1927 handbook shows which organisation's members preparing 'Some Mores' with the modern s'more recipe?

The Girl Scouts: the treat's name was a plea for 'some more', and by the 1930s it had been shortened to s'more.

Which sweet food, traces of which lay in a roughly 5,000-year-old tomb in Georgia, does not spoil when properly stored?

Honey keeps because its high sugar concentration and acidity stop many microbes growing. The key to preserving it is limiting its access to humidity.

Which frozen treat did 11-year-old Frank Epperson say he made by leaving a drink and stirring stick outside overnight?

The Popsicle took years to reach shops: Epperson first served his frozen treat at a fireman's ball in 1922, and his patent came through in 1924.

Cotton candy, sold as 'Fairy Floss' at the 1904 World's Fair, was invented by a confectioner and which professional?

A dentist, William Morrison, built the machine with confectioner John C. Wharton in 1897. Their floss sold 68,655 boxes at the fair.

Which pizza style did Greek-born cook Sam Panopoulos create in 1962 at the Satellite Restaurant in Ontario, Canada?

Hawaiian pizza has nothing to do with the islands: Panopoulos named it after the brand of canned pineapple he was using.

Which condiment was made mainly from mushrooms in Britain before James Mease published a tomato version in 1812?

Ketchup only became a tomato sauce in the 1800s. One leading theory traces the word to a Hokkien term for the brine of pickled fish.

British propaganda in World War II claimed pilots saw in the dark thanks to which vegetable, hiding the use of radar?

Carrots got so much credit that the British public believed it too, and by 1942 the country had a 100,000-ton surplus of them.

Which shellfish, now a luxury, was once so abundant in coastal New England that it was seen as a poverty food?

Lobster was so plentiful it was thought fit for indentured servants and used as fish bait. Tales of rules limiting it to twice a week have no evidence behind them.

Which fruit, native to China, was sold as the Chinese gooseberry until its exporters renamed it in 1959?

Kiwifruit got its name from exporter Turners & Growers after a US client warned that 'Chinese gooseberry' shipments might struggle at quarantine.

Which colour did accountant Walter Diemer give his 1928 bubble gum because it was the only dye he had on hand?

Pink was simply what the factory had: Diemer's recipe came out a dingy grey, so he diluted the only dye on hand, a red one.

Which fruit, botanically not a true berry, carries its seed-like achenes on the outside of its flesh?

Strawberry 'seeds' are each a tiny fruit in their own right, with the real seed inside; the red flesh grows from the flower's receptacle.

Which neighbour of France has an ongoing dispute with it about where French fries were invented?

Belgium also features in a legend about the name: American soldiers in World War I supposedly heard its army speaking French. But 'French fried potatoes' was in print by 1856.

Massachusetts hotelier Ruth Wakefield is generally credited with inventing which cookie at her Toll House Inn?

Chocolate chip cookies began with a bar broken up by ice pick and stirred into brown sugar dough. Wakefield later let Nestlé print her recipe on its wrappers.

Which convenience did Otto Rohwedder's machine first bring to shoppers in Chillicothe, Missouri, in July 1928?

Sliced bread caught on fast: by 1933 around 80% of the loaves sold in the US came pre-cut, which gave English its idiom for a great invention.

British sailors were nicknamed 'limeys' after citrus juice was added to their daily grog to prevent which disease?

Scurvy crept back after the fleet swapped lemons for limes grown in British colonies: limes hold only half as much vitamin C, and storage destroyed more.

Which plant's tart stalks are stewed for pies and crumbles even though its large leaves are poisonous?

Rhubarb leaves are loaded with oxalic acid, and people were poisoned in World War I when Britain mistakenly recommended them as food.

Which soft confection was first made from the root sap of a plant long used to soothe coughs and sore throats?

Marshmallow takes its name from the mallow plant, a wetland weed. Confectioners in 19th-century France whipped the sap from its root into a fluffy sweet.

John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola in 1886, after local prohibition laws passed, as a patent medicine in which US city?

Atlanta had just voted for prohibition, so Pemberton reworked his alcoholic coca tonic into a soft drink he claimed could cure headaches and indigestion.

In a famous legend, the herder Kaldi discovered coffee after seeing which animals grow lively from eating red berries?

Goats dancing on coffee berries make a good story, but it first appeared in print in 1671, some 800 years after Kaldi supposedly lived.

A gherkin or dill pickle starts life as which vegetable before it is soured in brine or vinegar?

Cucumber is in the word's history too: 'gherkin' comes from an early Dutch term for a small pickled one.

Which long pasta, thicker than spaghetti in Italy, has a name that comes from the Italian for 'little worm'?

Vermicelli is a diminutive of the Italian word for worm. Outside Italy the name usually goes to strands thinner than spaghetti, not thicker.

Which candy brand, first sold in 1927 as a compressed peppermint, takes its name from the German word for peppermint?

Pez only became a children's treat in 1955, when the company put heads on its dispensers. Santa Claus, Popeye and Mickey Mouse were among the first.

Which American baking brand is named after a cook who never existed, invented in 1921 to answer customers' letters?

Betty Crocker took her surname from William Crocker, a director of the flour company that dreamed her up, and had a portrait commissioned in 1936.

Which American cook, once a wartime intelligence researcher, brought French cuisine to US TV with The French Chef?

Julia Child joined the OSS in 1942 after finding that, at 6 feet 2 inches, she was too tall to enlist in the Women's Army Corps.

Which fast-food chain began in 1940 as a barbecue stand run by two brothers in San Bernardino, California?

McDonald's was first called McDonald's Famous Barbecue. Milkshake-mixer salesman Ray Kroc took notice in 1954 on learning the brothers were running eight of his machines.

Which tropical fruit is the national fruit of India and Pakistan and grows on the national tree of Bangladesh?

Mango trees are remarkably long-lived: some specimens still bear fruit after 300 years.

Baker's yeast makes bread dough rise by turning its sugars into alcohol and bubbles of which gas?

Carbon dioxide puffs up the loaf, and the same yeast species, in a different strain, is what brewers use to make beer.

Switzerland pioneered adding which element to table salt in the 1920s to prevent the thyroid swelling called goitre?

Iodine in salt did more than shrink goitres: a 2017 study found that the US rollout in 1924 raised IQ in the most deficient quarter of the population.

Which coffee drink is named after the colour of the hooded robes worn by an order of friars?

Cappuccino echoes the habits of the Capuchin friars: in 19th-century Italian writing the word meant black coffee tinted with a few drops of milk or cream.

Halloumi, a cheese that can be grilled without melting, must be made on which island to bear that name in the EU?

Cyprus holds the same protection in the US. The cheese's high melting point has made it a popular meat alternative among vegetarians.

Which Cantonese food tradition, whose name translates as 'touch the heart', grew out of snacks served in teahouses?

Dim sum began as two delicate bites served to complement a teahouse customer's cup. Going out for it is still called yum cha, 'to drink tea'.

Which spice was so prized that Alaric the Visigoth demanded 3,000 pounds of it in his ransom for Rome?

Black pepper was nicknamed 'black gold' and used as a form of money. Its bite comes from a compound called piperine.

In Denmark, 'Danish' pastries are named after which capital, reputedly thanks to bakers hired during an 1850 strike?

Vienna gets the credit in Danish: the pastries are called wienerbrød, 'Viennese bread', after Austrian bakers said to have been hired when local bakery workers walked out.

Margarine was invented in 1869 after which French ruler set a challenge to feed the army and the poor more cheaply?

Napoleon III's challenge was met by chemist Hippolyte Mège-Mouriès, who made his 'oleomargarine' from beef tallow but had little commercial success with it.

Which French gastronome wrote in The Physiology of Taste that a new dish does more for human happiness than a new star?

Brillat-Savarin published the book two months before his death, and it has stayed in print in France ever since. A soft cheese was named after him in the 1930s.

Which name is given to De re coquinaria, a collection of Roman recipes perhaps compiled in the fifth century AD?

Apicius borrows the name of Marcus Gavius Apicius, a gourmet of the first century AD to whom the recipes have been attributed.

Which stuffed griddle cake, the national dish of El Salvador, is honoured there with a national day each November?

Pupusa origins once came up in trade talks: in 2003 a negotiator for Honduras, which also claims the dish, ceded the right to El Salvador.

Which upside-down caramelised apple tart is named after two sisters who ran a hotel in Lamotte-Beuvron, France?

Tarte Tatin was never the sisters' own name for it: the title came after their deaths, from the food writer Curnonsky and the Paris restaurant Maxim's.

The fiery, spreadable pork sausage 'nduja, made around the town of Spilinga, comes from which southern Italian region?

Calabria's sun-dried chillies give 'nduja its heat; the sausage itself is made from meat trimmings and fatback.

Which French chef devised the kitchen brigade system and invented peach Melba for the singer Nellie Melba?

Auguste Escoffier drew on his own military experience to design the brigade, and the French press crowned him 'king of chefs and chef of kings'.

Which fermented fish sauce, used from Phoenicia to Byzantium, was a staple condiment of ancient Roman cooking?

Garum was made, by Pliny's account, from fish intestines and salt, which broke down into a liquor. The paste left behind had its own name, allec.