{"id":6034,"date":"2018-05-31T11:42:17","date_gmt":"2018-05-31T17:42:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/?p=6034"},"modified":"2019-01-14T15:19:55","modified_gmt":"2019-01-14T22:19:55","slug":"a-brief-history-of-the-chocolate-chip","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/a-brief-history-of-the-chocolate-chip.html","title":{"rendered":"Chocolate Chips – A Brief History"},"content":{"rendered":"
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We missed it by a couple of days – but not next\u00a0year!<\/em><\/div>\n
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Source:\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Mental Floss by Kate Erbland , May\u00a015, 2018<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\"iStock\"<\/p>\n

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\u00a0Celebrating National Chocolate Chip Day\u2014not a federal holiday, at least not\u00a0yet\u2014should be easy enough for all the classic dessert lovers and cookie aficionados out there. Just grab a bag of some chocolate morsels, whip them into some delectable cookie dough, and have at it. But have you ever wondered where exactly the chocolate chip came from? Who invented it? Who decided it was best for baking? Should we be calling it a \u201cchip\u201d or a \u201cmorsel\u201d? We\u2019ve got all those answers\u2014and more!\u2014in our brief history of the chocolate chip<\/h5>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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THE TOLL HOUSE MYTH<\/h4>\n
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Chances are, you\u2019ve made (or at least\u00a0eaten<\/em>) a Nestle Toll House chocolate chip cookie at some point in your life. The baking bits purveyor has long stamped their \u201cNestle Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookie\u201d recipe on the back of their various morsel packages (and yes, all Nestle packages refer to them as \u201cmorsels,\u201d not \u201cchips,\u201d but we\u2019ll get to that later), so it\u2019s no surprise that most people associate the famous cookie with Nestle.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

They\u2019ve even got a whole story to go along with the kinda-sorta myth of the Toll House cookie. The traditional tale holds that Toll House Inn owner\u00a0Ruth Wakefield\u00a0invented the cookie when she ran out of baker\u2019s chocolate, a necessary ingredient for her popular Butter Drop Do cookies (which she often paired with ice cream\u2014these cookies were never meant to be the main event), and tried to\u00a0substitute\u00a0some chopped up semi-sweet chocolate instead. The chocolate was originally in the form of a Nestle bar that was a gift from Andrew Nestle himself\u2014talk about an unlikely origin story! The semi-sweet chunks didn\u2019t melt like baker\u2019s chocolate, however, and though they kept their general shape (you know, chunky), they softened up for maximum tastiness. (There\u2019s a whole other story that imagines that Wakefield ran out of nuts for a recipe, replacing them with the chocolate chunks.)<\/p>\n

The recipe was such a hit (it first popped up in Wakefield\u2019s\u00a0Tried and True<\/em>\u00a0cookbook in 1938, and it even appeared on Betty Crocker\u2019s radio show, thanks to its massive popularity) that Wakefield eventually struck a deal with Nestle: They would feature her recipe on the back of every bar of semi-sweet chocolate the company sold, and she\u2019d get a lifetime supply of their chocolate.<\/p>\n

THE FAMOUS RECIPE<\/h4>\n
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Sounds great, right? Well, even if the story wasn\u2019t\u00a0exactly true\u00a0<\/em>(more on that later), it did spawn a classic recipe that\u2019s still the gold standard of chocolate chip cookie recipes, even though it\u2019s been slightly tweaked over the years. You can find the original recipe on the blog. Try it!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

THE REAL ORIGIN<\/h4>\n

The problem with the classic Toll House myth is that it doesn’t mention that Wakefield was an experienced and trained cook\u2014one not likely to simply run out of things, let accidents happen in her kitchen, or randomly try something out just to see if it would end up with a tasty result. As author Carolyn Wyman\u00a0posits<\/a>\u00a0in her\u00a0Great American Chocolate Chip Cookie Book,<\/em>\u00a0Wakefield most likely knew exactly what she was doing, and while that doesn\u2019t dilute how delicious the final product ended up being, it does make its mythic origin story seem just a smidge less magical.<\/p>\n

Even less magical? The truth about the deal Wakefield struck with Nestle. While Wakefield did indeed get free chocolate for the rest of her life\u00a0and\u00a0<\/em>the company paid her to work as a consultant, she was reportedly due a single dollar for her recipe and the good \u201cToll House\u201d name\u2014a dollar she never got.<\/p>\n

CHIPS VERSUS MORSELS<\/h4>\n

Although we call the cookies that bear them “chocolate chip,” the proper name for said chips is actually \u201cmorsels\u201d\u2014at least if you\u2019re Nestle.<\/p>\n

The moniker \u201cchip\u201d appears to have first popped up in the late\u00a0nineteenth century<\/a>, as part of an English tea biscuit recipe for \u201cChocolate Chips.\u201d These chips, however, referred to the biscuits\u2019 shape\u2014they were cut out of the pan into small strips that the recipe deemed as being \u201cchips.\u201d Interestingly, the recipe did call for actual chocolate\u2014but of the melted variety, not the morsel.<\/p>\n

In 1892, the \u201cchip\u201d title was first applied to\u00a0candy<\/em>, as a Kaufmanns candy ad from the time boasted of their supply of \u201cchocolate chips.\u201d A year later, another candy store advertised their own chocolate chip candies. Not so fast, though, because it doesn\u2019t seem like those chips had much to do with morsels as we know them; an 1897 court case involving the use of the trademarked name \u201cTrowbridge Chocolate Chips\u201d described the chips in question as \u201cthin oblong pieces of molasses candy coated with chocolate.\u201d This thin candy business continued into the 1930s, when Wakefield\u2019s recipe\u00a0hit the world<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wakefield\u2019s first published chocolate chip cookie recipe was actually called \u201cToll House Chocolate Crunch Cookies.\u201d When Nestle began publicizing the recipe, they simply became \u201cToll House Cookies.\u201d Since no one had bothered to invent pre-made chunks, morsels, or chips at that time, Wakefield\u2019s recipe graced the back of semi-sweet bars, which all included an individual cutter to chunk up the bars for cookie-making. The famous cookies\u00a0finally\u00a0<\/em>got the \u201cchip\u201d moniker some time in 1940, thanks to various newspaper articles and recipes about various cookies and their popularity. By 1941, \u201cchocolate chip cookies\u201d was considered the standard name for the sweet treat.<\/p>\n

Also in 1940, Nestle finally unveiled morsels for sale, and ads from the time tout the availability of both bars and morsels. Since then, Nestle has shared its famous chocolate chip recipe, all while selling its most important ingredient as \u201cmorsels\u201d (other brands, like Hershey\u2019s and Ghirardelli, call them \u201cchips\u201d).<\/p>\n

THE FAMOUS IMITATORS<\/h4>\n

Although Nestl\u00e9\u2019s morsels\u00a0and Wakefield\u2019s recipe pioneered the great chocolate chip cookie trail, they weren\u2019t the only ones\u2014there were plenty of imitators. In the ’50s, both Nestle and Pillsbury rolled out premade cookie dough for purchase. In 1963, Chips Ahoy hit shelves, thanks to Nabisco. By the time the ’70s rolled around, entire stores were dedicated to cookie sales\u2014including chocolate chips\u2014like Famous Amos, Mrs. Fields, and David\u2019s Cookies. What do they all have in common? That necessary chip. Er, morsel.<\/p>\n

May 15th Happy Chocolate Chip Day!<\/p>\n

Also<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

A New England Invention – America\u2019s Favorite Cookie<\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Source:\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>New England Recipes,\u00a0Website – Mary E. Gage.<\/p>\n

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Tea Biscuit<\/b><\/p>\n

The earliest I found the name \u201cChocolate Chip\u201d to show up was in the late 1800\u2019s in reference to a small English style tea biscuit. Tea biscuits are similar to our cookies.<\/p>\n

1894<\/u><\/p>\n

[Recipe] No. 557. Chocolate Chips. 15 c[ents]<\/p>\n

This was a recipe for a small sweet biscuit that was cooked in narrow pans, spread thin, cut into inch strips and served with afternoon tea. It used melted chocolate. The \u201cchip\u201d aspect came from the small squares the biscuit was cut up into. The recipe was in the 1894\u00a0The Little Epicure: 700 Choice Recipes<\/i>\u00a0(page 208) published in New York.<\/p>\n

Cream: \u00bc cup butter, 1 cup sugar
\nAdd: 2 Tablespoons melted chocolate, 1 teaspoon vanilla
\nMix: 1 cup flour
\nPour into greased pans and bake<\/p>\n

1899<\/u><\/p>\n

The Hostess of To-day<\/i>\u00a0by Linda Hull Lurned published a very similar recipe to the\u00a0Little Epicure<\/u>. It followed the same format: each recipe was numbered, named and its cost to the housekeeper was included \u201cNo. 674 Chocolate Chips 20 cts [cents]\u201d. In the five years between 1894 and 1899 the cost to make the tea biscuit rose by 5 cents.<\/p>\n

Candy<\/b><\/p>\n

Candy was the next type of chocolate sweet to acquire the name \u201cChocolate Chip.\u201d Candy with that name started to show up in the 1890\u2019s.<\/p>\n

1892<\/u><\/p>\n

In the\u00a0Pittsburg Dispatch<\/i>\u00a0(Pennsylvania) (December 18, 1892) Kaufmanns advertised \u201cOur new Candy Department\u201d in which they were the \u201cSole Pittsburg Agents for Whitman\u2019s Chocolate\u201d. In their advertisement they listed \u201cChocolate Chips\u201d.<\/p>\n

1893<\/u><\/p>\n

In Lewiston, Maine another store, Grants Candy Emporium advertised Chocolate Chip candies.\u00a0Lewiston Daily Sun<\/i>(December 23, 1893) \u201cOur line of 30 cent Chocolates is the finest in the city. A few of the many kinds: Chocolate Nougatines, Chocolate Walnuts, Chocolate Chips, Chocolate Colored Pepps, \u2026 This line of goods cannot be found anywhere else in the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

1897<\/u><\/p>\n

A Supreme Court case \u201cWhite et al. v. Trowbridge\u201d had to determine the rights of a trademarked name \u2018Trowbridge Chocolate Chips\u201d. The product was \u201cthin oblong pieces of molasses candy coated with chocolate and generally known as \u2018chocolate chips\u2019.\u201d Trowbridge manufactured its Chocolate Chips candy in Meadville, Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n

1902<\/u><\/p>\n

Mrs. Rorer\u2019s New Cook Book<\/i>\u00a0published in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1902 listed the earliest known homemade Chocolate Chip Candy recipe. It consisted of 1 pound sugar, 1 cup water, and 1 saltspoon of cream of tartar. A simple sugar candy that was rolled flat, cut into strips and dipped into melted chocolate.<\/p>\n

1906<\/u><\/p>\n

The\u00a0International Library of Technology<\/i>\u00a0listed Chocolate Chips \u201cnobody sells this favorite candy for as little as 39c. [cents] except this famous candy store. It is a thin and crisp molasses chip, finely flavored with lemon and covered with a smooth and pure chocolate\u201d The quote comes from an encyclopedia that was giving examples of how to market and advertise your product.\u00a0 It uses as its example a type of chocolate chip candy being sold at the time.
\n(Vol. 60, section 5, page 11)<\/p>\n

1910<\/u><\/p>\n

The\u00a0Boston Cooking School Magazine<\/i>\u00a0published a Chocolate Chips candy recipe. The candy was made with corn syrup and coated with melted \u2018Dot\u2019 chocolate.<\/p>\n

Recipe:<\/p>\n

Bring to a boil, continue until it reaches 254 degrees, or between a soft and hard ball
\n\u00bd cup sugar
\n\u00be cup glucose or corn syrup
\n\u00bd cup water
\nAdd:
\n1 teaspoon vanilla
\nTurn out on to marble and shape into rectangle, score in strips one inch wide, cool
\nCut into \u00bd inch long pieces and when cold dip in melted chocolate
\n\u2018Dot\u2019 Chocolate<\/p>\n

Vol. 14, No. 10, (May 1910) [page 495]<\/p>\n

1918<\/u><\/p>\n

The\u00a0Economic Cookery<\/i>\u00a0published in Boston had a Chocolate Chip candy recipe made with brown sugar and molasses, a taffy type candy that was coated with melted chocolate and cut into 1\u201d wide by \u00bd\u201d long. [Page 277]<\/p>\n

Candy both sugar and molasses that were cut into small strips like chips, and dipped in melted chocolate became popular and were sold as \u201cChocolate Chips\u201d. The candies originally were commercially made and later came recipes for homemade versions. The commercial candies were so popular the\u00a0International Library of Technology<\/i>\u00a0in 1906 gave directions to stores selling Chocolate Chip Candies on ways to advertise to the best advantage. The small size and the chocolate coating combined to give the candy its common name.<\/p>\n

Cookies<\/b><\/p>\n

The English style tea biscuit was the first to be called \u201cChocolate Chip\u201d. The tea biscuit although a small thin cookie used melted chocolate. This was followed by candies that also used the term \u201cChocolate Chip\u201d. The candies like the tea biscuits used melted chocolate. It was not until the late 1930\u2019s that \u201cChocolate Chip\u201d was used in the name of a cookie recipe. Chocolate Chip Cookies refer to cookies with\u00a0small chunks<\/u>\u00a0of chocolate that remain whole during the baking process.<\/p>\n

1930\u2019s<\/u><\/p>\n

The Original Chocolate Chip Cookie \u2013 Toll House Chocolate Crunch Cookies<\/i><\/p>\n

Sometime prior to 1936 Ruth Wakefield created a cookie with chocolate chips. She listed the recipe in her 1936 cookbook,\u00a0Toll House Tried and True Recipes<\/i>\u00a0under the name \u201cToll House Chocolate Crunch Cookies.\u201d (Wikipedia \u2013 \u201cChocolate Chip Cookie\u201d entry). The couple owned a former Toll House which they converted into an inn and restaurant. One source says Ruth Wakefield\u2019s recipe was published in a Boston newspaper and other papers in New England (ideafinder.com\/history\/inventions\/tollhouse). Newspapers were a common way to publish a new recipe. It is likely she did publish her recipe in a newspaper(s) but without specific names and dates this can not be verified.<\/p>\n

In 1939 the Wakefield\u2019s formed an agreement with the owners of Nestle chocolates whereby Ruth\u2019s recipe was published on 7 oz. bars of Nestle\u2019s semi-sweet chocolate with the yellow wrapper. Nestle\u2019s shortened the name to \u201cToll House Cookies\u201d. At first, the company developed a cutter to break the bars of chocolate up into small pieces. The morsels came later.<\/p>\n

Chocolate Chips and Chocolate Chip Cookies
\n1938 – 1941<\/i><\/p>\n

The previous year, in July 1938 the\u00a0Chicago Tribune<\/i>\u00a0carried a recipe named \u201cChocolate Chip Cookies\u201d.\u00a0 In the\u00a0Youngstown Vindicator<\/i>\u00a0(Nov. 26, 1939) the newspaper carried an article \u201cMake Up Your Christmas Cookies Early, Too\u201d by Mrs. Alexander George. The recipe \u201cChocolate Chip Cookies\u201d listed 8 squares dipping chocolate cut in quarter-inch cubes. In the\u00a0Montreal Gazette<\/i>\u00a0(Nov. 28, 1940) carried an article \u201cKeep Cookie Jar Full Is Rule for Good Cook\u201d. This \u201cChocolate Chip Cookies\u201d recipe listed 1 package semi-sweet chocolate \u201ccut each small square of chocolate in 4 to 6 pieces.\u201d In these two recipes squares of chocolate were cut into small pieces.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Pittsburgh Press<\/i>\u00a0(March 26, 1940) ran an advertisement, \u201cHow to Make Famous Toll House Cookies.\u00a0 From the famous Toll House Inn at Whitman, Massachusetts, comes this recipe for cookies that are taking the country by storm.\u201d Under the recipe it states, \u201cInsist on Nestle\u2019s Semi-Sweet Chocolate in the Yellow Wrap,\u201d. The yellow wrapper was used on 7 oz. bars. The statement, \u201cInsist on Nestle\u2019s \u2026\u201d indicates other companies were producing semi-sweet chocolate squares or bars at the same time.<\/p>\n

\"EarliestFrom April 1940 through October 1940 Nestle ran a series of advertisements in national newspapers with the recipe for Toll House Cookies. The advertisements vary in wording but follow a similar basic text. All have a recipe that calls for cutting the nestle bars into \u201cpea size\u201d bits. The first advertisement for\u00a0Nestle morsels<\/i><\/b>\u00a0appears in the Springfield Republican on December 6, 1940 (shown on the right). The ad is for both the bars and morsels. It lacks the illustration of the morsels that appears in 1941 advertisements. The end of the ad campaign for the bars on October and the appearance of an ad for both bars and morsels in December suggests that morsels first came to market in either November or the first week of December 1940. It was probably timed to take advantage of the holiday season.<\/p>\n

The earliest reference to the term \u201cchocolate chips\u201d as the name of a precut piece of chocolate appeared in the\u00a0Pittsburgh Press<\/i>\u00a0on April 18, 1941. The newspaper printed a recipe for \u201cChocolate Chip Squares are Tops\u201d. The recipe listed \u201cone 7-oz. package semi-sweet\u00a0chocolate chips<\/i><\/b>\u201d.<\/p>\n

How a Recipe Swept the Nation by Storm?<\/i><\/p>\n

Between 1938 and 1941 the recipe that was created in Whitman, Massachusetts traveled across the United States and into Canada. It showed up in newspapers in the following cities: Chicago, IL, New York, NY, Los Angeles, CA, San Jose, CA, Milwaukee, WI, Hartford, CT, Phoenix, AZ, Youngstown, PA, Pittsburg, PA, Lewiston, ME (?), Sarasota, FL, Fort Dearborn, MI, and Montreal, Canada. By May 1940 an article in the\u00a0Chicago Tribune<\/i>\u00a0had this to say, \u201cwill share honors with the famous chocolate chip cookies that are such a universal favorite today.\u201d<\/p>\n

How a recipe becomes known as an old fashion tradition?<\/i><\/p>\n

In May 1941 the\u00a0New York Times\u00a0<\/i>carried an article that said, \u201cChocolate chip cookies are an old fashioned New England [tradition] that has only recently been discovered by city dwellers.\u201d The cookie was about 6 or 7 years old.<\/p>\n

Oddly, the famous\u00a0Boston Cooking School Cook Book<\/i>\u00a0did not publish the recipe until its 1947 edition under the name \u201cChocolate Chip Cookies\u201d. The recipe was an exact match to Ruth Wakefield\u2019s famous \u201cToll House Chocolate Crunch Cookies\u201d except that it reduced the ingredients by half. In 1939, Nestle chocolates had acquired the exclusive right to the name \u201cToll House Cookies\u201d. This forced Fannie Farmer, author of the\u00a0Boston Cooking School Cook Book<\/i>\u00a0to use the common name, \u201cChocolate Chip Cookies\u201d.<\/p>\n

This cookie has two common names: \u201cChocolate Chip Cookies\u201d and \u201cToll House Cookies\u201d.<\/p>\n

Chocolate Chip Cookies<\/b><\/p>\n

1\/2 cup butter, softened
\n1\/3 cup white sugar
\n1\/3 cup brown sugar
\n1 egg, beaten
\n\u00bd teaspoon vanilla
\n1 1\/8 cups flour
\n\u00bd teaspoon salt
\n1 teaspoon baking powder
\n\u00bd cup chopped nuts
\n1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips<\/p>\n

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We missed it by a couple of days – but not next\u00a0year! Source:\u00a0\u00a0Mental Floss by Kate Erbland , May\u00a015, 2018 \u00a0Celebrating National Chocolate Chip Day\u2014not a federal holiday, at least not\u00a0yet\u2014should be easy enough for all the classic dessert lovers and cookie aficionados out there. Just grab a bag of some chocolate morsels, whip them … Continue reading “Chocolate Chips – A Brief History”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[112,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellaneous-information","category-sweets-cookies"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6034"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6034\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6857,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6034\/revisions\/6857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/margie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}