In the mid 1960s, there was a television commercial extolling the golden, crunchy goodness of potato chips. Its catch phrase was “I bet you can’t eat just one!” Truer words were never spoken. A tiny nibble off the edge of a potato chip, no matter what your good intentions, led from the nibble to a normal size bite. Without thinking, you had eaten the entire chip in a blink of an eye. You thought to yourself, another chip can’t hurt. Nor the next one, nor the one after that. What was happening?! Good heavens! Was the commercial right? Were you turning into a potato chip junkie?

Let’s shed some light on the origins of this crunchy treat.

In the mid 1850s, frying potatoes was an accepted and popular form of American cooking. The normal manner of preparing fried potatoes was to slice them across the narrow axis and then fry them. They were not eaten with the fingers google but rather, served with a fork, to be consumed in a genteel manner. Restaurants across the nation were serving fried potatoes, but it wasn’t until the chef at Moon Lake Lodge in Saratoga Springs, New York, sliced the potato pieces so thin did they become the