Top 10 Foods and Beverages Created By Accident
Just about every food has an interesting story behind it. Some of these were actually happy accidents, whether they arose out of laziness, improvisation, luck, or unforeseen circumstances. Here, we take a look at the best accidental food inventions. Boy, are we glad for these accidents!
Refusing to get up from his seat as he was in the middle of an intense gambling session, John Montagu requested that meat be placed between two pieces of bread and brought to him. While some believe it was work that kept him at his desk for many hours, either way, it was Montagu's refusal to get up for a meal that resulted in the creation of one of the most famous finger foods.
I'm glad all the things on here were created because they are all delicious!
The greatest mistake ever, literally, because sandwiches are delicious.
Who created the invention? An 11-year-old. It all happened when Frank Epperson left a cup filled with powdered soda, water, and a stirring stick on his porch overnight in 1905. Because of the low temperature that night, Epperson discovered the mixture completely frozen the following morning.
The summertime staple was made.
This was actually one of the most iconic examples of food being invented by accident, since it was caused by an 11-year-old.
Imagine how popular that kid would be if this happened today. It would be all over the Internet.
One day, when Ruth Wakefield, owner of the Toll House Inn, ran out of baker's chocolate, she decided to add small pieces of sweetened chocolate to her batter as a substitute. She had expected the chocolate to melt, but the result was even better.
The chips didn't spread and instead retained their individual form, softening to a moist, gooey melt. Thus, the chocolate chip cookie was born.
I don't know where I would be in life if this hadn't happened.
Some of my favorite sweets ever. Glad I can enjoy them.
The story of cheese curls' creation is weirder than you think. They are a by-product of animal feed.
The Flakall Company invented a machine that crushed grains for animal feed without hulls and grain dust. While attempting to produce animal feed through the machine, the process wasn't perfect. To reduce clogging and clean the machine, Flakall workers put moistened corn into the grinder. However, during the process, the machine got so hot that the moist corn didn't flake out anymore but puffed up instead.
Edward Wilson, an employee, saw potential in the little puffs and took some home. There, he experimented on them and developed them into a snack - a snack he called Korn Kurls.
Translated to little donkey? Either way, they are delicious, and I'm glad they exist! Who knows if Chipotle would be a thing?
Okay, I did some research. Here is how it was invented: Juan Méndez, a street vendor in Chihuahua, Mexico, invented the burrito. During the Mexican Revolution in the 1910s, Méndez decided to wrap his food in flour tortillas to keep it warm and transport it on his small donkey. He then realized that wrapping the food in a tortilla was tasty and a good way to serve it.
As Misfire mentioned, the potato chip originated from a potato that a chef's customers despised. In an act of defiance, he cut it into small, chip-like shapes. To his surprise, everyone loved it, giving rise to one of the most iconic foods in history.
At Saratoga Springs' Moon Lake House, an unsatisfied customer kept complaining that his fries were too thick. After enduring these complaints, the chef decided to slice the last batch of potatoes as thinly as he could. To his surprise, the customer loved the result.
In 1885, when Atlanta banned the sale of alcohol, John Stith Pemberton decided to create a purely coca-based version of his "French Wine Coca." This was a syrup of wine and coca extract he made to cure his addiction to morphine. He mixed this with carbonated water, and the result was the beverage called "Coca-Cola."
It all happened in 1943 when a group of ten military wives decided to stop by for some dinner at the Victory Club in Piedras Negras, Mexico. Unable to track down the chef, maître d' Ignacio "Nacho" Anaya decided to improvise and cook something out of what was left in the kitchen, creating the Mexican staple we know today as "nachos."
Although the first ice cream cone was produced by Italo Marchiony in 1896, a similar creation was independently introduced in 1904 by Ernest A. Hamwi. At the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair, Hamwi was selling a crisp, waffle-like pastry (known as zalabis) in a booth right next to an ice cream vendor who had run out of cups. To assist his neighboring concessionaire, Hamwi rolled one of his waffles into the shape of a cone, enabling the ice cream to be held inside.
Customers loved the innovation, and the concept quickly gained popularity.
The Slurpee wasn't invented at 7-Eleven but at a Dairy Queen in Kansas. In the late 1950s, after his soda fountain broke down, Omar Knedlik, the store owner, was forced to move his sodas to the freezer. He accidentally left them in for too long. However, he decided to sell the partially frozen drinks anyway.
Customers loved them so much that Knedlik decided to create a machine specifically for producing these partially frozen sodas.
Brothers John and Will Kellogg were trying to make granola when they made corn flakes by accident. In 1898, the siblings were unaware that they had left a pot of boiled wheat to go stale. When they discovered this, they decided to experiment to see what they could do with it.
To their surprise, instead of obtaining long sheets of dough as they had hoped, they found flakes, which the brothers then toasted. The rest was history. Breakfast hasn't been the same since.
The Wheaties story is the first that comes to mind when I think about this list.