Chocolate Chip

Cookies

Chocolate chip cookies are one the the most

traditional (and yummy!) American

foods, and if you have ever eaten some, you

can certainly understand why.

Now, did you know that this super yummy treat

was born from a mistake?

YES! Here is the story:

It was a lady called Ruth Graves Wakefield that

invented chocolate chip cookies.

In 1933, Ruth and her husband Kenneth had

an inn in Massachusetts, where Ruth cooked for all of

her guests.

She was a good cook and started to become famous in the area for

her desserts.

One day, she was preparing some Butter

Drop Do Cookies for her travelers, when

she realized that she didn’t have the Baker’s

Chocolate that the recipe called for. (Baker’s

Chocolate is a special kind of chocolate used for baking that

melts completely.)

What Ruth had was some Nestlé’s Semi-

Sweet Chocolate bars, so she chopped some up and mixed it into the dough she was

preparing.

Well, can you guess the rest of the story?

The chocolate did not melt into the dough

like Ruth had expected. Instead, it

softened and left little “pockets” of chocolate

in the cookies.

Thank heavens Ruth decided to serve the cookies anyway; and so history was made!

Everyone loved them, and they became so

popular that Ruth even published her recipe in the newspapers! They

were called “Toll House Crunch Cookies”

As the recipe spread and became popular,

so did the Nestlé semi-sweet chocolate bars.

So Nestlé bought the right to print Ruth’s

recipe and created the “Toll House Chocolate

Chips”

Which are simply the most famous

chocolate chips in the US, to this day.

In exchange, Ruth got a lifetime supply of

chocolate for all of her baking needs!

And we got one of the most delicious treats

ever.

There’s nothing better than warm chocolate chip cookies with a glass of cold milk.

Today, some seven billion chocolate chip cookies are consumed every year in the US.

That’s a lot of cookies!

If you have already tasted one, I am sure

you will join me in saying “Thank you,

Ruth, for making that mistake and not throwing those

cookies in the trash that day!”

Now, if you want the recipe for the Original Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookies, you, or

your parent, can come to our first

Cooking Class, and we will make some!

(Produced by Monica Cardoso and Alice Bello)