Food Non-Fiction

In this Food Non-Fiction podcast episode, we talk about the creation of the Rice Krispies Treats. In 1928, Kellogg’s introduced the Rice Krispies cereal to the public. In the same year, the company hired a recent home economics graduate of Iowa State University - her name was Mildred Day. Her job was to test recipes for Kellogg’s and she also travelled around the country conducting cooking schools for the company’s customers.

Kellogg’s recipe testers were asked to develop recipes using Kellogg’s cereals. So Mildred Day and her friend Malitta Jensen put their heads together to create something delicious.

They created what we now know as Rice Krispies Treats or Rice Krispies Squares, but back then they called it “marshmallow squares”.

By the way, they didn’t create the recipe from thin air, it’s likely they tweaked the recipe using either the Puffed Wheat Squares recipe in the 1938 cookbook, It’s Fun to Cook, or they may have used an older recipe from 1916 which was a recipe for something called Puffed Rice Brittle.

Either way, the molasses and vinegar were removed from the original recipe and Campfire Marshmallows were added. One source said that Mildred Day chose to replace molasses with marshmallows because marshmallows are less sticky.

You should also note that Mildred Day and Malitta Jensen were part of the Campfire Girls organization.

The Campfire Girls sold boxes of Campfire Marshmallows back then, much like how Girl Scouts sell Girl Scout Cookies. So perhaps that inspired the use of marshmallows in the recipe.

Soon after the marshmallow squares recipe was created, the Campfire Girls organization needed to raise some money to support their summer camp and activity programs. So, Kellog’s, being a company with a reputation for helping out in the community, lent a hand.

It was a good opportunity for them to test out their new marshmallow squares on the public after all. They set up a temporary kitchen to produce batches of marshmallow squares for the Campfire Girls to sell as part of a fundraiser.

Mildred Day worked in the temporary kitchen for two intensive weeks, every day from 6:30AM to 10PM. She was a dedicated Campfire Girls Troop leader and her scouts were able to sell hundreds of Rice Krispies Treats in Michigan during that summer in 1939.

Kellogg's executives noted how much families loved the marshmallow squares. Kids loved them because of the taste and parents loved them because of the price. Remember, this was 1939 - the back-end of the Great Depression and the front-end of the second world war, so price was important.

So, Kellogg's trademarked the Rice Krispies Treats name in 1940 and added the recipe to the back of the Rice Krispies cereal boxes in 1941.

In 1995, Kellogg's started making the packaged version of the treats for grocery stores.

We spoke with Malitta Jensen's grandson, Jay Hewlett about his grandmother. She was a determined and successful businesswoman and a loving grandmother.

Special Thanks to Our Guest:

Jay Hewlett

Thank you to Looperman Musicians:

What’s Goin Down by rasputin1963 Visuality by danke 140 BPM Acoustic Guitar by ferryterry

Inspired by the book, "Chocolate Wars", by Deborah Cadbury, today we're telling you the incredible true story of how how the biggest chocolate companies in the world fought for our tummies and tastebuds through innovation after innovation that eventually turned cocoa products from a drink, to an edible chocolate, to a milk chocolate powder, and finally, to our beloved milk chocolate bar.

In the 1860s/70s cadbury experimented with and successfully created the first mass-manufactured chocolate bar. Milk chocolate bars did not yet exist at this time, so it would have been a plain dark chocolate bar.

This was a big breakthrough. The fact that these bars could be mass-produced meant that they could be cheaper...more affordable, so more people could buy it and try it.

By the 1890s, everyone in Britain was buying cocoa products - it was no longer just an exotic treat for the rich. In the decade from 1890 to 1900, the amount of cocoa consumed in Britain was doubled.

Over in Switzerland, around the same time that Cadbury had managed to mass-produce their plain chocolate bar, Daniel Peter was working on making the world’s first milk chocolate powder.

We know that Daniel Peter happened to be neighbors with Henri Nestlé of Nestle fame. And according to one story, Daniel had a baby daughter, named Rose, who wouldn’t take breast milk. So he asked his neighbor Henri for help, because he had just started selling a powdered milk developed for babies.

So baby Rose was saved, because she could drink Nestlé’s powdered milk. At the same time her father, Daniel, got the idea to use the powdered milk to create a milk chocolate powder, which of course did not exist at the time. Although, people were already drinking cocoa powder with milk, so they would have been familiar with the flavor.

In 1875, Daniel su cceeded in making the world’s first milk chocolate powder - it was called “Chocolats au Lait Gala Peter”. It was a success.

He thought about making his drink into a chocolate bar...a milk chocolate bar. After years of working to create a milk chocolate bar, Daniel finally created one he could sell - he called it “Gala Peter”. The year was 1886.

Elsewhere in Switzerland, at around the same time, another important chocolate innovation was happening.

Rodolphe Lindt, of Lindt chocolate fame, created a much smoother chocolate after pressing the beans for longer than the norm. He experimented with different temperatures and timings to get as much cocoa butter folded into his mix as possible. This created a delicious melt-in-your-mouth chocolate. (Even today Lindt chocolates are known to be silky smooth.)

He invented a machine called “a conch” because it looked like a conch shell. Chocolate bars used to be hard and gritty, but now they could be softer and smoother.

So what we’re seeing at this time is more and more people getting into the business of cocoa, and working hard and innovating to get ahead.

Now, back in Britain, Cadbury’s innovations made them very successful. As Quakers, George and Richard Cadbury wanted to use their money to create an ideal place for their employees to work.

In 1878, they bought the idyllic land for their model factory that would be surrounded by nature. The factory was a manufacturing marvel. It was built to be one-storey tall, so that goods would not have to go up and down stairs.

And they built cottages and gardens around it with spaces to play sports or relax. They called the model Town Bournville, and Bournville would be the inspiration for model towns to come. Including, the town of Hershey, which we’ve done an episode on.

At around this time in the 1870s, young Milton Hershey was still in Philadelphia trying to make his candy shop successful.

In England at that time the Quaker-led chocolate companies dominated. The 3 Quaker companies, Fry, Cadbury and Rowntree were all powerhouses. But they were all being threatened by European competition. You can imagine it must have been hard to compete with Lindt’s smooth chocolate and Peter’s milk chocolate coming out of Switzerland. So the Quaker firms discussed pricing and advertising with one another, essentially working together not to destroy each other.

Cadbury had to figure out how to make a product that could compete with Swiss chocolate. After a trip to Switzerland and much experimentation, George Jr. created a chocolate bar you may have heard of - it was Cadbury’s Dairy Milk, and it launched way back in 1905. That means Dairy Milk has been around for over one hundred years.

The first world war really leveled out the chocolate playing field. The big British Quaker companies, including Cadbury, had to withdraw their best products.

The Swiss, including Nestle, were very impacted because their home market was small and they had relied on selling across Europe and abroad, but exporting became dangerous. The s...

This episode explores the history of Halloween and the vague beginnings of trick or treating!

Thank You To Our Interviewee:

Professor Nick Rogers

Thank You To Looperman Artists for the Music:

Melody by Slice0fCake Father Grimlin - Temperament Strings by JulietStarling Dark Creepy Piano by Zaqsi

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Thank You To Our Interviewee:

Kyleena Falzone of Secret Stash

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Thanks to Looperman Artists for the Music:

Apollo by SANTIAGOO