Potato Chips

Did you ever wonder where the idea for potato chips came from?

No?

Well, I did.

How Restaurant Complaints Can Change the World
The potato chip is the fortuitous result of a restaurant complaint . In 1853 at Moon's Lake House, a high-fashion resort in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., a patron complained that chef George Crum's fried potatoes were too thick. According to the Nat ional Snack Association, Crum was miffed - and decided to fry up a batch of potatoes so thin and crisp that they couldn't be skewered by a fork. His get-even plan backfired: the unhappy patron and other restaurant guests loved his innovation, and Crum's "Saratoga Chips," as they were first called, immediately became a popular restaurant item. By 1895, entrepreneurs began making potato chips for sale in stores, but potato chips really took off with the invention of a mechanical potato peeler in the 1920s. According to the Snack Food Association, potato chips are currently a $6 billion retail market, making them America's number one savory snack. Annual consumption of potato chips and shoestring potatoes in the U.S. amounts to 17 pounds per person.