Chocolate Chip Day
May 13, 2011
Do you have it on your calendar? Sure, today is a Friday the 13th, but never fear, the antidote is right around the corner. May 15 each year is National Chocolate Chip day!
Of course this brings up the question, “Who invented the Chocolate Chip?” The answer is a very American story.
...The better question is, “Who invented the chocolate chip cookie?” It's a better question because it really all started with the cookie.
Ruth Graves Wakefield is credited with having invented the first chocolate chip cookie in the 1930s.
Ruth, along with her husband Kenneth, owned the Toll House Inn, near Whitman, Massachusetts.
The most popular version of the story goes like this:
One day Ruth was making a cookie recipe and found she had to substitute semisweet chocolate for the baker's chocolate. She had a chocolate bar which she chopped into small pieces, thinking they would melt into the dough just like the baker’s chocolate always did.
But, much to her surprise, when she took the cookies from the oven, the small chocolate bits had not completely melted. They only softened. Her new “chocolate chip” cookie turned out to be a big hit with her guests!
The semi-sweet chocolate bar that Ruth used had come from the Nestle Chocolate Company. As the Toll House Inn chocolate chip cookie recipe became popular, sales of Nestle's semi-sweet chocolate bar increased.
Nestle and Ruth Wakefield struck a deal. Nestle would print the Toll House Cookie recipe on its packaging, and Ruth Wakefield would receive a lifetime supply of Nestle chocolate! How about that for a deal, a chocolate lover's dream!
Today, Nestle produces around 250 million chocolate chips – every single day! And, about 25% of all cookies baked in the United States are chocolate chip cookies!
Now you know some history of this great national holiday.
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