I Didn't Know That - Worcestershire Sauce

Worcestershire Sauce

If you can't think of Worcestershire sauce without thinking of Lea & Perrins, blame it on more than just branding. In the early 1800s, chemists John Lea and William Perrins tried to duplicate an Indian sauce recipe for Worcester nobleman Lord Sandys. The chemists found the result of their attempt "unpalatable" and moved on to other projects while the jars of sauce gathered dust in the cellar. Years later, they tasted the aged sauce and found it delicious and savory. The men bottled the sauce and sold it throughout Europe. In 1839, New York entrepreneur John Duncan imported the sauce to the states where it became the oldest commercially bottled condiment in the U.S.

Just in case you were wondering, you can properly pronounce the sauce a number of ways: "WUST-ter-shire," "WOOS-ter-sheer," or "WOOS-ter-sher" sauce, according to manufacturers. 

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I Didn't Know That - Icee

Icee

Contrary to popular belief, 7-Eleven did not invent its well-known slushy frozen drink. The slurpee was a happy accident of Omar Knedlik, a Dairy Queen owner in Kansas City during the 1950s. When Knedlik's soda fountain broke down, he improvised by putting some soda bottles in the freezer to stay cool. He served the not-fully-frozen bottles to customers who ended up loving the consistency of the cool treat. 

Knedlik then created his own machine that added carbon dioxide to make the drink fizz then held a naming contest. The drink became known as ICEE. In 1965, 7-Eleven licensed Knedlik's machine and their ad agency director named the drink Slurpee® after the sound made while drinking it through a straw. To date, 6.5 billion Slurpee® beverages have been sold through the store alone and approximately 13 million people sip Slurpees each month, according to 7-Eleven. 

Slurp on that!

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I Didn't Know That - Chocolate Chip Cookies

Chocolate Chip Cookie

Chocolate lovers everywhere bow to the greatness that is Ruth Wakefield's accidental creation — the chocolate chip cookie. Wakefield was the owner and occasional cook of the Toll House Inn in Whitman, Massachusetts. One day Wakefield was making a batch of chocolate cookies when she ran out of baker's chocolate. Improvising, she used broken pieces from a Nestlé semi-sweet chocolate bar thinking the dough would absorb the melted pieces. Instead, she accidentally created chocolate chip cookies. 

Wakefield called the cookies "Toll House Crunch Cookies" and the recipe was eventually published in a Boston newspaper. This got the attention of Andrew Nestlé, the chocolate provider whose chocolate was used in Wakefield's fruitful mishap. In exchange for a lifetime supply of chocolate, Wakefield agreed to let Nestlé print her cookie recipe on their chocolate packaging. You can still find the Toll House cookie recipe on Nestlé packaging today! 

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I Didn't Know That - Cheese Puffs

Cheese Puffs

Cheese doodles, cheese curls, cheese balls, corn curls — whatever you call it, this crunchy, cheese-powdered snack came from the brain of Edward Wilson, a curious employee at Flakall Corporation, a producer of corn-based feed for animals. Wilson noticed the machines that produced cornmeal would sometimes get so hot that the cornmeal came out in puffy cooked pieces that hardened as they came in contact with air. One day he took some of the puffy pieces home, added oil and the cheese flavor, and made the first cheese puffs. By 1946, Flakall Corp produced the earliest known version of cheese puffs that they called Korn Kurls. 

To date, there are over 324 variations of cheese puffs, including the popular Cheetos and Utz's Cheese Balls. The addictive snack is even spoofed in pop culture with this satirical scene from South Park. 

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I Didn't Know That - Corn Flakes

Corn Flakes

In 1898, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg (sounds familiar?) and his brother Will Keith Kellogg accidentally left cooked wheat out long enough that it became stale. Hoping to turn the stale wheat into long sheets of dough, the Kellogg brothers forced it through rollers, but the rollers flaked the wheat instead. The brothers then toasted the flakes and found it perfectly edible. Later, Will Keith tried the same method on corn and thus was the beginning of corn flakes cereal. 

In 1906, W.K. Kellogg created the first consumer batch of Kellogg's Corn Flakes. More than a century later, the Kellogg brothers' cereal empire includes more than 30 products. As of 2013, corn flakes' sugar-coated alternative Frosted Flakes ranked #2 on the list of 10 best-selling cereals in the U.S.

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I Didn't Know That - Champagne

It’s no secret that some of the best inventions happened by accident. Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming was working with bacteria and mold when he discovered penicillin. Before the age of microwaves ovens, American engineer Percy Spencer noticed the chocolate in his pocket melted every time he walked in front of a vacuum tube generating small electromagnetic waves. Serendipitous discoveries aren't confined to technology; they also happen in the kitchen! A tablespoon of genius mixed with a pinch of luck cooked up these accidental food creations ...

Champagne

The creation of the celebratory bubbly isn't credited to any one person, but to poor winemaking practices in the 15th century. During the late 1400s, Europe experienced an extreme temperature drop that froze both the Thames River and the Venice canals. The cold also stopped the fermentation process of grapes in Champagne, France, where the monks in the Abbey of Hautvillers created red and white wines. As spring brought warmer weather, the grape juice resumed fermenting and released carbon dioxide inside the bottle, which produced a new, throat-tickling quality. 

The Catholic church called in monk Dom Pierre Pérignon to curb the fizz from the remaining fermented wine. However, Pérignon's attempts only succeeded in refining champagne blending techniques. Thanks to increased consumption from French nobility, sparkling wine increased in popularity and became a symbol of expensive taste.

Fun fact: According to trade laws, only sparkling wine made in the Champagne region is called champagne. 

Pop, fizz, and clink to that!

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