Top 10 Modern Foods With (Mostly) Delicious Histories

9. French Fries

Of all the foods to have an origin story, this one seems to be the most clear cut as to where it came from. Unfortunately, there’s an ongoing dispute between France and Belgium as to who really made it.

The French side states that, in the late 17th Century, potatoes were regarded unfit for human consumption, and only for pigs to eat. When a famine struck in 1785, this mind-set changed, and the French gave the potato another chance. It caught on so well, by 1795 they were grown everywhere, with even some royal gardens being converted to help grow the friendly spud. During this boom, someone had the smart idea of frying the slices and selling them as ‘frites’. Thus, the French fry was born.