You might think you don’t know what a cheese doodle is, but you have almost certainly seen them around. A cheese doodle is a rather colloquial way of calling those baked cheesy snacks that are sure to leave your fingers bright orange. Sold as crisps, for a bit of cheesiness to your lunch you can’t go far wrong than picking up a packet of these tasty morsels. Just try not to eat too many!
All great foods deserve a day of observance – so of course, this classic and popular snack has March 5th to celebrate it in all its cheesy, savory goodness.
The History of Cheese Doodle Day
The inventor of cheese doodles is not entirely clear – the date when exactly they first appeared isn’t easy to find. Usually, food historians will attribute the bite-size treat to one of two inventors; either one Edward Wilson and/or Clarence J. Schwebke, who worked at the Flakall Corporation in Wisconsin around the 1930s. This company actually specialized in making flaky pet food, but created what was called ‘Korn Kurls’ as a (for humans) snack and applied for a patent in 1939. The snack was commercialized in 1946 by another company, the Adams Corporation.
The second most commonly cited inventor is Elmer Candy of New Orleans, Louisiana, around 1936. Today, Elmer’s Fine Foods still sells cheese doodles under the name ‘CheeWees’.
Cheese doodles are also known as cheese puffs, cheese curls, cheese balls, cheese poofs, cheesy poofs or sometimes corn cheese. They are made by a mixture of hot corn through a shaper and then dusted with that distinctive cheese flavoring. Without cheese, it’s often referred to as puffcorn; different flavorings available include honey and salt, but the most popular type worldwide has to be these cheese flavored versions.
Available in all sorts of shapes and sizes, pounds and pounds of this tasty and easy go-to snack are made every year and shipped across the word the hungry snack lovers everywhere.
From Foodimentary.com:
- Cheetos cheese-flavored puffs became a hit in the 1950’s. Soon after, Cheez Doodles appeared.
- “Cheez Doodles fingers” is the official term used when you get cheese powder on your fingers after eating any cheese flavored snack food.
- Cheez Doodles are said to be one of the only packaged snack foods preferred by Julia Child.
- They have recently entered pop culture as the preferred snack of ESPN NBA analyst Stephen A. Smith. They are also the favorite snack of Lincoln Peirce’s comic character Big Nate.
- Wise (the company that produces Cheez Doodles) recently made their Crunchy Cheez Doodles “cheezier,” more akin to Cheetos’ flavor.
