15 Famous Foods That Were Invented By Accident

1. Chocolate Chip Cookies

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Ruth Wakefield was the the owner of Toll House Inn in Massachusetts.  She accidentally created the scrummy chocolate chip cookie in the 1930s.  She did so by adding broken fragments from a chocolate bar into cookie batter, assuming it would melt in the oven.  Surprisingly and fortunately it didn't.  We thank her from the bottom of our hearts!

2. Nashville Hot Chicken

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Nashville is most famous for country music but second on the list has to be its hot chicken.  Apparently a womaniser named Thornton Prince was seeing another lady and his long time partner wanted to teach him a lesson.  She doused some chicken in hot peppers but the plan backfired as Prince loved the taste and went on to open up a chicken shack.

3. Potato Chips

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The world’s most popular snack food, the potato chip, was invented in 1853 by accident.  A chef called George Crum was working at a hotel in New York and when one of the guests returned a plate of fries because they weren't crispy enough, Crum sliced the potatoes wafer thin, fried them in il, salted them and sent them back out.  They were named Saratoga Chips.

4. Coca Cola

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John Pemberton always wanted to create a drink but didn't intentionally make it into a soft drink.  The original aim was to come up with a tonic with added alcohol to cure an array of ailments.  When Georgia ran out of alcohol, Pemberton went ahead and made it without that ingredient.  Fast forward and Coca Cola is enjoyed all over the world.

5. Ice Cream Cones

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In 1904 Ernest Hamwi, a Syrian immigrant, was making wafer desserts at the side of an ice cream stand.   Story has it he approached the ice cream seller and suggested they combine the two.  Cones were originally called cornucopias and Hamwi went on to open the Missouri Cone Company back in 1910.

6. Chimichangas

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Chimichangas have a complicated past with several restaurants claiming they invented the deep fried, delicious burrito.  One story is that Monica Flin who owned the El Charro Cafe in Arizona whipped up a snack of burritos and one accidently fell into some hot oil.  Flin shouted "chimichanga" and the product was officially born.

7. Popsicles

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An 11 year old boy was responsible for creating popsicles.  In 1905 Frank Epperson of San Francisco mixed a sweet soda powder and left it outside in the porch.  Following a very cold night, the substance froze, Epperson tasted it and loved it and the "epsicle" was invented.  In 1924 he patented it and changed the name to popsicle so it would be child friendly.

8. Dippin' Dots

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From the crunch in between your teeth to the cold ice cream that follows, dippin' dots are a real crowd pleaser.  You have Curt Jones to thank!  He was a microbiologist, working in 1987 on flash-freezing animal food.  He then had a stroke of pure genius.  He could use the same process on ice cream and create a "bead."

9. Buffalo Chicken Wings

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When Teresa Bellissimo, owner of the Anchor Bar in Buffalo, New York, received a delivery of chicken wings instead of chicken necks she didn't want them to go to waste.  She deep fried the wings, coated them in a hot sauce and served them with a blue cheese and celery dressing.  They were a huge success and still are!

10. Worcestershire Sauce

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Back in 1835, Lord Sandys returned to England from Bengal India and he really missed his favorite Indian sauce.  He commissioned John Lea and William Perrins to recreate it.  These two drug store owners overdid it with the odor of the sauce and hid it away in a cellar for 2 years.  After that time, they saw it had aged beautifully and tasted divine.  The rest is history!

11. Champagne

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For so many years, monks who produced the wine we now know as champagne tried everything to get the bubbles out of their white wines.  Sometimes the fizz would cause the bottles to explode!  When stronger glass was developed and the wine carbonated even more, Benedictine monk Dom Pierre Pérignon decided to brand the fizz and champagne was born!

12. Toasted Ravioli

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There is absolutely nothing toasted about toasted ravioli!  Much like the chimichanga, this is a food that happened after the stuffed pasta pockets were deep fried by accident.  Two St. Louis restaurants both claim that the accidental frying took place in their own kitchen.  Whichever of the two it was, we don't care.  We're just glad it happened!

13. Tarte Tatin

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Legend has it that the Tatin sisters owned a hotel and restaurant in Lamotte-Beurvron, France.  Whilst one of the sisters cooked, the other manned the reception.  During a very busy lunch service, the "cooking sister" forgot to add the pastry top to the apple pie.  In the heat, the apples caramelized so she quickly put some dough over the top and hey presto.  There was a Tarte Tatin.

14. Yogurt

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Yogurt has been around for ages, originating in Turkey in the 6th century BC.  So how was it discovered?  Central Asian herdsmen stored extra extra goat’s milk in containers which were made out of animal stomachs.  When the containers were opened at meal time, the milk had thickened and turned sour.  The good bacteria had taken over and yogurt came to be.

15. French Fries

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Communities living in French speaking parts of Belgium used to catch small fish and fry them for dinner.  During the winter when the river was frozen over, they were unable to fish.  Instead they cut up potatoes so they looked like little fish and fried those instead.  This is where we got French fries from.

16. Chicharrones

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Not sure if this is true but one bizarre story as to the origin of chicharrones is that a Spanish farmer noticed his hog had scratched its back against a tree and rubbed the skin off itself. The skin baked in the sun and not sure why, probably out of curiosity, the farmer tasted it and loved it!

17. Oyster Sauce

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Lee Kum Sheung ran a food stall in Nanshui, China in 1888.   He placed a big pan of oyster soup on the top of the stove and left it to simmer, ready for his customers at lunch time.  He only remembered many hours later about the oysters and when he looked in the pot, the ingredients had reduced to a brown thick paste.  It was very savoury and customers bought it to season their rice.  Oyster sauce was a huge hit!

18. Mozzarella

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An Italian cheesemaker, so legend has it, invented mozzarella by accident.  Some curdled milk fell into a pan of boiling water in his cheese factory in Naples.  The result was astounding.  He was faced with a creamy, rich delicacy which we now know as mozzarella.

19. Eton Mess

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There have been a few tales as to how Eton mess came about.  One story is that a strawberry, cream and meringue pudding was dropped at a cricket match between Eton and Harrow.  Instead of throwing it away, it was picked up and served, leading to the creation of this classic British dessert.

20. Corn Flakes

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Cornflake lovers have enjoyed this cereal since 1890 when brothers John and Will Kellogg experimented to make a healthy vegetarian food.  They toasted wheat berries and forgot they were cooking the grains! They ended up with crunchy, thin flakes we now know as corn flakes.

21. Slurpees

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Omar Knedlik was the owner of a Kansas City Dairy Queen.  When his soda fountain broke, he had to store some bottles in his freezer.  When he tasted it, he knew he was on to a winner so he designed a machine to get the same effect. Eventually 7-Eleven started licensing Knedlik machines, calling the chilled treats Slurpees.

22. Beer

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The earliest reference of beer we know of is from the 6th century BC in Sumeria.  It is thought that someone was making bread outside and then stopped when the rain came down. The bread was left in the rain for some time and the wet dough turned into a fermented liquid.  We now know this to be beer.  Cheers!

23. Raisins

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Going way back to 2000 BC, people would notice dried grapes on vines.  The fruit hadn't been picked and it had been basking in the hot sun.  This is how we first got raisins.  They were originally used for decoration, given as prizes at sports events and even used in medicine.

24. Pink Lemonade

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Plain lemonade goes back to the 17th century with the arrival of European immigrants.  Pink lemonade has a different background.  Henry E Allot dropped red colored cinnamon candles into lemonade at the local circuses and the liquid turned blush pink.  There are other theories, each one more crazy than the one before but thought to be made up!

25. Crepe Suzette

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A French waiter, Henri S Charpentier, mistakenly burned the sauce he was making for crepes.  One of the influential patrons at the restaurant was the soon to be King Edward  VII.  He enjoyed the taste so much that he wanted it named after the woman he was with - Suzette!

26. Sandwiches

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John Montagu, the 4th Earl of Sandwich, didn't want to leave the gambling table he was sat at so requested something he could eat at that table.  His chef brought him some meat in between two pieces of bread.  The Earl was a fan of this convenience food and it soon caught on.

27. Cheese Curls

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Flakall Corporation invented a feed grinder to flake up corn based feed so it could be easily digested by the animals.  To clean the machine the workers added damp corn to the grinder and when it got hot, it puffed up like popcorn.  One of the employees and future snack legend Edward Wilson, took the corn puffs home and seasoned them. How mad is that!

28. Fortified Wine

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So wine could be transported by sea, vintners tried to find ways of reducing the quantity of the wine and to add more alcohol to preserve it.  They would store it in caskets during the journey and reconstitute it at the destination.  The technique did not work out but by not messing around with the recipe, fortified wine was born.

29. Tofu

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Tofu was invented by the ancient Chinese, with two origin stories.  One tells of a cook who put nigari, a coagulant, into a pan of soy milk.  The other tale is that boiled soy beans were mixed with salt which caused it to congeal.  Whichever is true, tofu is a great meat free alternative.

30. Nachos

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When the chef went missing at a restaurant in Mexico in 1943, the maitre d needed to get food for ten military wives.  He covered a large plate with tostadas and grated cheese, heated it up and then added jalapenos.  One of the women said the dish was "Nacho's especiale"  The maitre d, Anaya, shorted the dish to nachos and opened up his own place, Nacho's Restaurant.