Good morning, it’s Tuesday.
I’m going to go out on a limb and declare that few – if any – desserts can rival the perfection of we well made chocolate chip cookie. This isn’t really much a of a stretch declaration, as well over half of adults across the nation say that chocolate chip is their favorite cookie variety, and this nearly ubiquitous treat has become almost synonymous with the best sweet that America has to offer.
The Nestle Toll House recipe, long printed on the back of every bag of its semi-sweet chocolate morsels, has been a gateway for untold numbers of home bakers. It’s easy to access, easy to follow, and very hard to screw up. With minimal work and a short time in the oven, you have reliably gooey and chocolate-packed cookies every time.
If you’re familiar with the recipe in question, you’re probably also familiar with the chocolate chip origin story that a woman named Ruth Graves Wakefield, a dietician, chef, and cookbook author who co-owned a well-known inn in Massachusetts with her husband, “accidentally” discovered the secret to Toll House cookies.
Sadly, as is too often the case with many widely-repeated stories, this one isn’t entirely true.
Wakefield was a skilled and savvy baker. Her skills at perfecting colonial-era desserts was widely known and helped build the clientele of the Toll House Inn, which was located on Bedford Street in Whitman, MA, until it burned to the ground in a fire in 1984. Though there is a historic marker at the site, it is now occupied by some very bland modern-day chains: a Walgreens and a Wendy’s.
The story goes that Wakefield had been working to perfect a certain pecan butterscotch cookie that her customers particularly loved and wanted to add baking chocolate to the batter but found she was out of this key ingredient. Instead, she decided to use an ice pick to chip pieces off of semi-sweet Nestle’s chocolate bars, which didn’t melt as she expected, but maintained their integrity in the final baked product.
This was all supposedly a happy accident, but food historians have since revealed that Wakefield actually conceptualized the recipe long before she got into the kitchen – likely on a flight back from a vacation to Egypt. There are also reports that a number of other bakers had been putting chips of chocolate in cookies and selling them commercially for some time prior to Wakefield’s supposed “discovery.”
Whatever the case, Wakefield’s Toll House cookies were a big hit and she DOES deserve credit for helping to popularize the recipe, which she traded to Nestle’s for just $1 that she jokingly said she never received, a lifetime supply of chocolate, and a consulting agreement. Personally, I think she got the short end of the stick on that one, since Nestle, a publicly traded, multinational Swiss corporation, is worth about $258 BILLION today – give or take a few – and Wakefield continued operating her Toll House Inn.
Wakefield retired from inn-running in 1966 and sold her famous property. She died in 1977 at the age of 77. Her legacy lives on in the form of widespread love and appreciation of the cookie she helped make nearly ubiquitous, and, of course, the Toll House recipe on the back of all those yellow bags.
Happy National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day, which, by the way, will be celebrated with free cookies at select chains, locations, and stores!
We’re going to get a reprieve from the rain today with a perfect summer day on tap. Skies will be sunny and clear, with temperatures topping out in the mid-80s.
In the headlines…
Despite President Trump’s comments that negotiations with Iran were set to begin yesterday afternoon, U.S. officials said that there are no “new” or novel negotiations planned – just the ongoing talks taking place through mediators.
President Trump on Monday urged U.S. oil companies to take action to ease gasoline prices, saying that the energy giants “made too much money” from high oil prices due to the Iran war.
Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, today reported a 33 percent increase in profit despite severe disruptions to its supply routes caused by the war in the Middle East.
Iran and Oman are closing in on an agreement to reopen shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, but if the accord goes into effect it could come at a high price — ratifying Tehran’s control over what, before the war, was an open, international waterway.
Trump met in the Oval Office with Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney in Washington, and Doug Burgum, the interior secretary whose department oversees the Reflecting Pool, hours after he said Pirro “choked” in the pool vandalism case.
A pair of documents issued by the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, that narrow or dissolve aspects of a deal to resolve President Trump’s lawsuit against the I.R.S. have met the demands of two Republican holdouts.
Truth Social is charging Wall Street up to $1.2 million a year for a split-second edge on posts that can — and frequently do — jolt global markets.
Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., said he plans to introduce legislation to ban the president from selling expedited access to his statements after Trump’s social media company launched a paid service over the weekend for real-time, potentially market-moving alerts.
U.S. District Judge Mae D’Agostino issued a preliminary injunction that said New York State officials can’t prohibit law enforcement officers – including immigration agents – from wearing masks while on duty.
Twenty-five states – including New York – sued the Trump administration Monday over its latest tariffs, calling them a pretext for replacing import taxes the Supreme Court struck down in February.
More than 170,000 federal student loan borrowers who said they were defrauded by their schools are set to have $11 billion in debt erased, after an appellate court sided with the borrowers and rejected a request from the DOE for more time to review their claims.
Unable to unite behind a single candidate in Michigan’s Seventh Congressional District, moderate Democrats worry that they’ve complicated their chances in a key November battleground.
Darializa Avila Chevalier, the democratic socialist who ousted New York Rep. Adriano Espaillat in a June primary upset, plans to seek membership in both the Congressional Black Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus once sworn in.
A national convention of Democratic Socialists of America members had attendees daydreaming about an AOC presidential run — while debates raged about if they should ever back a pro-Israel candidate.
Long Island Democrats ignored Gov. Kathy Hochul on their websites even though the incumbent is sitting on top of the party ticket in the November elections.
After Hochul and AG Letitia James sued the prediction market platform Kalshi for $36 billion Friday — alleging an illegal gambling operation — the response from Trump administration regulators sounded more pungently political than official or businesslike.
New York is investing more than $9 million to strengthen the cybersecurity of its drinking water and wastewater systems after hackers targeted water utilities in other states.
A new evaluation of court-mandated treatment for mentally ill New Yorkers suggests the system’s harms outweigh its benefits.
Around 2,000 people have filed for an exemption to the NYC pied-à-terre tax — and 4,800 more have at least started the process amid the new levy’s controversial rollout, City Hall said.
Following a week of mass confusion about eligibility — to the point where his administration extended a deadline to appeal the tax — Mamdani seems to understand where frustrated New Yorkers are coming from.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani yesterday defended his push for free buses in wake of Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chair Janno Lieber’s allegation that the mayor’s rhetoric has played a role in increased fare evasion in NYC.
Mamdani’s promised city-owned grocery stores won’t require ID from shoppers, his administration confirmed Monday — allowing non-New Yorkers to take advantage of the discounted goods.
The mayor has laid out a package of roughly 50 proposals to help small businesses as part of his OPEN plan, which stands for “Overhauling Procedures & Expanding Navigation.”
Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson slammed the Mamdani administration’s decision to award a $1.86 billion contract for hotels across the five boroughs to provide emergency space for the homeless — calling it “insane.”
Tel Aviv Vice Mayor Guy Avner challenged Mamdani to a boxing match, citing the American mayor’s anti-Israel statements and accusing him of fomenting hatred towards the Jewish people.
New York City’s latest crime statistics reveal a stark contrast for the city: while overall major crime continues to fall to historic lows, bias-motivated attacks, specifically targeting Jewish New Yorkers, have seen a sharp and troubling rise.
A $506 million bet on thousands of New York rent-stabilized apartments has already soured for bond investors. Mamdani’s rent freeze threatens to make it worse.
The Mamdani administration and a major insurer agreed to pay up to $53 million to reimburse retired civil servants who said they’d been wrongly charged copays for medical visits.
New York City officials want the state to make solar more accessible to apartment dwellers by allowing small panels to plug into standard outlets without advance utility permission.
New York City’s Education Department is changing how it responds to students who are chronically absent due to school avoidance, according to an agreement officials signed last week with the legal team that brought a class action lawsuit over the issue.
Former Schools Chancellor David Banks and ex-First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright have snagged top New York officials as podcast guests, despite the lingering cloud of Adams-era investigations.
This past weekend, former Mayor Eric Adams was in Wisconsin Rapids—population 18,654—trying to convince residents that they should allow a real estate developer to build a data center in the heart of their town.
A crew of subway riders who say they’ve been overcharged and issued phantom fines on their MTA-issued OMNY cards want the state’s top prosecutor to investigate the alleged debacle.
An NYPD cop died after suffering complications from breast implant removal surgery in the Dominican Republic — and now the mom of three’s family is demanding a malpractice investigation, according to reports and authorities.
New York City recorded the fewest shooting incidents, shooting victims and murders in recorded history during the first seven months of the year and in the month of July, the NYPD said.
More than 400 attorneys, social workers and other support staff who represent low-income New Yorkers in criminal, immigration, housing and family courts are absent from courtrooms across the Bronx and Manhattan as they enter another week of striking.
Most New York City beaches were closed to swimming yesterday as forecasters warned that dangerous surf and rip currents could make entering the water life-threatening.
Three New York City-area hospitals earned coveted spots on U.S. News & World Report’s annual “honor roll,” reserved for the nation’s top 20 hospitals delivering exceptional care across multiple specialities.
A gobsmacking 62 government retirees — including double-dipping former Big Apple chief lifeguard Peter Stein — pulled pension payments of at least $200,000 last year from the city’s retirement system, data shows.
Whale watchers in New York and New Jersey have documented their 500th individual humpback whale in local waters, a milestone they said highlights the creatures’ growing role in the local ecosystem.
Suffolk County must shell out up to nearly $60 million to settle a lawsuit over the $30 “administration fee’’ it slapped on its now-defunct red-light-camera tickets, according to a new settlement.
As horse racing has struggled to field contenders for the Triple Crown in recent years, the sport has had difficulty staying in the public consciousness. Churchill Downs, owners and host of the Derby, and the NYRA are teaming up in an effort to change that.
Some ranked choice voting advocates in Albany are pushing for a system that would eliminate primaries. Some political leaders are trying to kill the proposal after initially supporting it under the incorrect assumption it would resemble New York City’s system.
The Hoffman Car Wash on Delaware Avenue in Bethlehem that has been closed over concerns that the hill above the Normans Kill where it is located could give way will not reopen.
The co-owner of Taste of Italy in Latham, who caused a firestorm of condemnation and ongoing protests with anti-Muslim comments a month ago, have launched a GoFundMe campaign, hoping to raise $24,000 to “help our family and businesses recover from crisis.”
A Town of Greenport police officer is facing a driving while intoxicated charge after she drove her patrol car off the road.
Despite advisory opinions against changing the Saratoga Springs historic preservation model, the mayor says he’s “adamant” on amending the city’s unified development ordinance, which critics say will override the authority of the Design Review Board.
Brown’s Beach off Route 9J on Saratoga Lake remains closed after heavy rain July 29, according to the Town of Stillwater.
A birthday celebration at the USS Slater brought Coast Guard members, veterans and the Albany community together ahead of the service’s 236th anniversary.
The Capital District Transportation Authority is continuing to implement comprehensive service updates in the Glens Falls region.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
